Posts Tagged ‘yahoo’

« Older Entries

Top SEO tactics for small businesses

Monday, November 16th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

I read an article on Entrepreneur.com a while back, entitled, “Rev up the Search Engines.” It gives a helpful rundown of solid SEO principles for small businesses, which don’t have a whole lot of money to spare but need to start generating results from ecommerce.

Bicyclist soaring through the airThis article gives six tips for a small business to get the most bang for its buck, when it comes to search engine optimization. They are attributed to Steve Wiideman, a fairly renowned SEO expert. I already talked about most of these in my SEO series right here in the eHarbor Blog, back in February and March of 2009. But I think a refresher is healthy.

Here is one highlight I took from these tips:

- Search engines are getting smarter. Don’t expect Google, Bing or Yahoo to fall for the same old SEO tricks. Bloggers and other content generators used to focus on their keyword-to-content ratio, but now search engines recognize when you use the same keyword too many times in the same post. Use relevant keywords prudently. If you use keyword-stuffing tactics, don’t expect much success.

You can find the rest of this blog entry on the Submit Solution SEO Blog on November 23, 2009. It will be called, “Getting your business on top with SEO.” The photo of the flying biker is from Flickr, and it is the copyright of Tom Grundy Photo.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Ecommerce, Pay-Per-Click, SEO, Social Media | No Comments »

Google flexes its creative muscles

Wednesday, October 21st, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Search-engine giant Google is trying to buck the overall downward trend in Internet advertising sales by grabbing a bigger slice of the pie.

Cat in a Coke box

In my blog entry, “Google tries to expand into new PPC forum,” I talked about Google’s attempt to make its new DoubleClick Ad Exchange successful. At the end I touched on Google’s attempts to grow beyond its core competency of search ads into the world of display ads. I’ll pick up where I left off.

According to the Wall Street Journal article, “Google Decides to Find Its Creative Side,” Google is trying to translate its ownership of YouTube and DoubleClick into a more dynamic advertising approach. Google is so well-known as the king of search ads that it might be difficult for it to break into Yahoo’s territory of creative display ads.

They’ve already created YouTube ad campaigns for J.C. Penney and Quaker Oats, but they saved their most innovative campaigns for Hewlett-Packard and Volvo. For those two companies, Google helped create YouTube ads and display ads featuring the latest updates (tweets) from Twitter.

Search engines are notoriously slow in catching up to social-media sites like Twitter and Facebook. You can read my insights into this topic in my blog entry, “Google can’t keep up with Twitter.” It’s a promising sign that Google is making this effort to use Twitter in its online-advertising services.

You can find the rest of this blog entry in the Submit Solution Paid Search Blog on October 27, 2009. The photo of the cat in the Coca-Cola box is from Flickr, and it is the copyright of Greencolander.

By the way, I thought of giving this blog entry the title, “Google develops rock-hard ads,” but I wisely decided against it.

Tags: , , , , , , ,
Posted in Pay-Per-Click, Search Engines | No Comments »

How to get inbound links

Thursday, August 20th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

This is a follow-up to my previous blog entry, “I link, therefore I am… on top of Google.” I’m talking about what I learned at Webmarketing123’s August 5, 2009 Webinar, “Advanced SEO Webinar: Linking Best Practices.” Without further ado, I’ll return to where I left off.

Fingers touching light

Unless a website is cached or saved by search engines on a regular basis, the links found on it won’t count toward the search engine optimization of the sites it links to. That explains why Google can’t keep up with Twitter and other social-media sites, as I discussed in an earlier eHarbor Blog entry. It’s trying to take a snapshot of websites that change multiple times every second.

Returning to caches, I learned a cool trick at the Webinar that I would like to share. If you want to know if a Web page is cached by Google, all you have to do is type “cache:www.thesitename.com” into a Google search and it will tell you.

The big question is how do you get inbound links? After you’ve gone through and added great content that is relevant to your keywords, you can start using the following sources to get inbound links:

- Directories

- Paid Listings

- Article Syndications

- Blogs

- News Releases

We’re starting a new blog on the newly redesigned Submit Solution website, which will debut soon. We’ll be transferring our ecommerce and Internet marketing articles from the eHarbor Blog to that one soon. You can find the rest of this blog entry there after it debuts.

The photo of the fingers touching light is from Flickr, and it is the copyright of littledan77.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in SEO, Search Engines | No Comments »

What the Microsoft-Yahoo merger means for ecommerce

Friday, July 31st, 2009

By Robert Lockard

It looks like two Davids are joining forces to take on Goliath. After years of public wrangling over the details, Microsoft and Yahoo finally announced a proposed 10-year partnership between their search-engine and online-advertising departments on Wednesday, July 29, 2009.

Microsoft-Yahoo combination“In simple terms, Microsoft will now power Yahoo search while Yahoo will become the exclusive worldwide relationship sales force for both companies’ premium search advertisers,” the official Microsoft news release said.

We’re starting a new blog on the newly redesigned Submit Solution website, which will soon be launched. We’ll be shifting attention from the eHarbor Blog to that one. You can find the rest of this blog entry there when it comes out. Stay tuned!

The Microsoft-Yahoo logo is from Flickr, and it is the copyright of JVManna.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Pay-Per-Click, Search Engines | 1 Comment »

Bucking recession, ecommerce keeps growing

Monday, March 23rd, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Great news! The ecommerce industry isn’t showing any signs of slowing down. It’s actually growing in strength, despite the recession. What a pleasant surprise!

Surprised kittens

According to an article in Practical Ecommerce, entitled “Chart of the Week: Search Engine Marketing to Increase,” marketers in the United States are expected to spend $14.1 billion on search engine marketing in 2009. That’s a 16-percent increase from 2008’s $12.2 billion. If it continues to grow at this rate, the amount spent on search engine marketing in the United States could reach $23 billion in 2013.

Search engine marketing is made up of paid-search advertising, contextual advertising, paid inclusion, and search engine optimization. We just finished a series on SEO strategies. I recommend reading those blog entries, if you’d like more information.

You might remember my blog entry on the success of eHarbor, Inc. not long ago. I’m pleased to note this is not just an isolated incident, but an industry-wide one. As the economy sours, businesses are turning more to the Internet for new customers, and getting high placement on search engines, like Google, MSN and Yahoo, is a great way to get their attention.

Be sure to check out eHarbor, Inc.’s affiliates for help in designing and optimizing your websites. These affiliates include: Submit Solution, Magellan Commerce and Real Estate Promoter.

The photo of the surprised kittens is from Flickr and it is the copyright of telachhe.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Ecommerce, SEO, eHarbor | 12 Comments »

Step 6 to topping Google: Strong anchor text

Wednesday, March 11th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Welcome to part 6 of our multi-part series on effective search engine optimization tactics. You may notice that in many of my blog entries, I include links to past blog entries and other informative sites. I try to include appropriate text for each link in order to give you (and search engines) an idea of what information the link will contain. This Ship anchor in Greenock, Scotlandtext, known as anchor text, is another way to optimize your website for search engines.

Anchor text should be specific and closely related to the topic you are addressing. If you put in random links that are neither relevant to your content, nor descriptive of the information on the linked site, you are wasting your time. Links should be helpful to your website’s visitors, offering them additional information in a highly visible manner.

For instance, if I want to create a link to the Submit Solution website, I simply link the text “Submit Solution” to http://www.submitsolution.com. So when you see text that is blue, purple or red, you know that it links you to Submit Solution’s website or at least something related to Submit Solution (which, by the way, is a division of eHarbor, Inc.). As a bonus, search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN also use the anchor text to understand the relevance of that page to this one, potentially boosting your ranking.

Here are some good ideas to consider when choosing anchor text for your links:

- Keep your text short and descriptive. Brevity seems to be a common theme in this SEO series – like in my blog entry on optimizing images.

- Avoid generic terms like “Click here” or “article.” Those really don’t describe what the link is, and there are many other creative ways to anchor your links. Come to think of it, I mentioned avoiding generic terms in my blog entry on Web page titles, as well. It feels like we’re coming full-circle in this series.

- Don’t use the actual URL as the anchor text, unless you have a good reason. I used the URL of Submit Solution above simply as an illustration. You can also include a URL to promote your website, if it is new or poorly connected at the moment. You know, I think we discussed good URL practices earlier, as well.

- Make sure your links are easy to spot. If you use a style that makes links look just like regular text, people won’t be able to find them, and they won’t be much use.

By the way, including internal links to different parts of your website can help visitors navigate your website more freely and intuitively. Give it a shot, but don’t go overboard. Make sure the links are meaningful and add to the message of the page you are currently working on. Improving website navigation – that’s another topic we’ve covered before on the eHarbor Blog! Simply amazing.

This is the sixth part of this series. We started with a blog post on making content king, and we’ve covered a number of topics along the way. We’re coming close to the end of this series on strong SEO practices. We’ve got plenty of other great ecommerce topics to talk about, as well. Check out Google’s SEO Starter Guide for more information on this topic. The photo of the naval monument in Greenock, Scotland is from Flickr and it is the copyright of Bob the courier.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Ecommerce, SEO, Search Engines | 3 Comments »

Step 5 to topping Google: Website navigation

Thursday, March 5th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Welcome to part 5 of our multi-part series on effective search engine optimization practices. Thanks for sticking with me through this fun little series. This is my 12th blog entry on the eHarbor Blog. I’ve had a lot of fun talking about eHarbor’s history, eHarbor’s future, and even several reasons to smile.

Disorganized garage in Tokyo, JapanWe started this series by talking about improving website content, and continued with a post on designing Web page titles and optimizing images. Now we’ll consider how best to organize websites to improve navigation for both search engines and customers.

You can choose a number of ways to organize your website content. Just make sure you’re consistent. Here are some good ideas to optimize your website navigation:

- Create a quick, intuitive navigation system. Allow visitors to click just once or twice from the homepage to find the specific information or services they’re seeking.

- Be careful not to link every page to every other page. This can cause confusion. Provide relevant links to other pages, but don’t go overboard.

- Stick with text-based links to navigate your site. Using Flash or drop-down menus can make it difficult for search engines to crawl through your site.

- Include a list of your main categories on the sidebar of each page. This can help visitors quickly browse through topics without having to return to the homepage often.

- Use well-designed URLs, as we discussed in the last blog entry in this SEO series. If people cut off part of your URL, try to make it so it will still lead them to part of your website. For instance, if you take this blog entry’s URL www.eharborinc.com/blog/2009/02/03/what-eharbor-is-and-
why-it-matters-to-you and cut off the last part so you are left with www.eharborinc.com/blog/2009/02, the link still works.

It’s also a good idea to include a sitemap on your website to boost usability to site visitors and visibility to search engines. There are two kinds of sitemaps that have two different functions: HTML sitemaps and XML Sitemaps. XML Sitemaps usually have a capital S to differentiate them from HTML sitemaps, so I’ll follow that rule.

An example of a sitemap can be found on the Real Estate Promoter website: www.realestatepromoter.com/index.php?base=site. This sitemap lists all of the main pages and their subcategories in a clear, concise manner. It is best to organize your website by subject matter, putting specific materials under appropriate categories. If you were selling real estate on your website, you could use something like this for your setup:

Homepage -> Properties for sale -> Waterfront homes, condos, rental units and other specific property types

HTML sitemaps are mainly designed for website visitors, not necessarily for Google, MSN, Yahoo or other search engines. Search engines can use them to understand the context of pages on your website, but they should be focused on helping your visitors find what they’re looking for if they get lost.

XML Sitemaps are much better at providing information about your site to search engines. You should consider using a Sitemap if:

- You recently created your site. Google often finds sites through links from one Web page to another, so new sites with no inbound links are almost invisible to it. A Sitemap allows search engines to find your website, even if it is relatively new.

- Your site has dynamic content like AJAX or Flash.

- Your site has a large number of archived pages that are not linked together.

A Sitemap gives search engines a great deal of information, including:

- How often your Web pages are updated with new content. Blogs and other content-dense sections of your website can gain more attention this way.

- Which pages are more important than others, in terms of hierarchy. Your homepage would have the highest ranking, while categories would be slightly below it, and materials under those categories would be a little lower. This helps search engines understand the context of Web pages, but it doesn’t affect a page’s search-engine ranking if it is ranked below other pages on the site.

If you would like a step-by-step walkthrough to help you set up a Sitemap for your website, check out Google’s Sitemap Generator script.

This is the fifth part of this series. We’re coming close to the end of this series on strong SEO practices. Check out the Submit Solution website for more ideas on building SEO on your website. We’ve got plenty of other great ecommerce topics to talk about, as well. Check out Google’s SEO Starter Guide for more information on this topic. The photo of the messy garage in Tokyo is from Flickr and it is the copyright of coccu.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Ecommerce, SEO, eHarbor | 7 Comments »

Step 4 to topping Google: Simplify URLs

Wednesday, February 25th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Welcome to part 4 of our multi-part series on effective search engine optimization practices. I took a little break in my last blog entry to talk about some fun things that make me smile. Let’s back to talking about important SEO tactics. We’ve talked about making content king on your website, adding concise Web page titles, and optimizing images on your site. Now we’ll talk about simplifying your Web pages’ URLs.

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) movie posterTo start things off, it’s time once more for me to apply my love of movies to the discussion at hand. As Indiana Jones noted in a key scene of “Raiders of the Lost Ark” (1981), “Belloq’s staff is too long. They’re digging in the wrong place!” You’ve probably seen that movie, so you know that Indy’s nemesis had part of the instructions to build the staff of Ra, but because his staff was too long he was led to the wrong place in his search for the Ark of the Covenant.

All of this is highly applicable to URLs. If a URL is too long, it can be difficult for customers to remember and difficult for search engines like Google, MSN and Yahoo to catalog. If Indy were a webmaster, he would probably have said, “Belloq’s URL is too long. They’re Digging in the wrong place!”

That might be a little silly, though.

Examples of long URLs that are poorly structured and hard to follow can be found at Mapquest and Google. On Mapquest, I looked up the mailing address of eHarbor, Inc. and it gave me this: http://www.mapquest.com/maps?city=Orem&state=UT&address=13
23+N+Research+Way&zipcode=84097&cat=eHarbor%2C+Inc.#a/sea
rch/l::1323+Research+Way:Orem:UT:84097-6200:US:40.321124:-1
11.680809:address:Utah+County:1/m::15:40.324683:-111.679178:
0:::::/so:Eharbor+Inc:::r::25:::::/e.

Google searches are a little better. Here’s the URL of a search I did for eHarbor: http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=
1G1GGLQ_ENUS311&=&q=eharbor&btnG=Google+Search&aq=f.

Now that’s a mouthful.

I don’t mean to slight Mapquest or Google. The purpose of their URLs isn’t necessarily to look pretty and get posted on websites. They exist solely to contain search parameters and show people what they’re looking up. However, in the world of ecommerce, keywords are essential, and you want your URLs to reflect that.

Here are some principles that can help you create strong URLs for your Web pages:

- Use a simple organization structure on your website. For instance, on the Magellan Commerce website, if you click on the “Features” tab, you will go to this URL: http://www.magellancommerce.com/features. Very simple. Just add a / to your main URL and include a word or phrase describing what is in that section. As you add content to sub-pages, you can simply add another / and additional words describing the content on those pages.

- Along with the first point, it’s better to use words than numbers in your URLs. Words are much more “friendly” to your site’s visitors and they help optimize your pages for search engines. Using “page 1” or seemingly random numbers and code to organize your URLs isn’t pretty and doesn’t help much with SEO.

- Don’t use too many keywords in your URLs. Be brief but descriptive about what people can expect to find on each Web page. No need for a whole lot of repetition.

- Only create one URL for each Web page. It’s possible to have multiple sub-domains and versions of a URL. For instance, you could have http://submitsolution.com and http://www.submitsolution.com go to two different sites. Choose one form of a URL, with or without www, and stick with it. Also, you’re better off only using lower-case letters in URLs, instead of mixing capital letters in.

This is the fourth part of this series. We’ll cover several other ways to achieve SEO in upcoming blog entries. Check out Google’s SEO Starter Guide for more information on this topic. The “Raiders of the Lost Ark” movie poster is from Flickr and it is the copyright of MDH in Houston.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Movies, SEO, Search Engines, eHarbor | 7 Comments »

Step 3 to topping Google: Optimize your images

Thursday, February 19th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Welcome to part 3 of our multi-part series on constructive search engine optimization practices.

In my last two blog entries, I discussed strong content writing and Web page titles as ways to build search engine optimization for your website. Today I’ll discuss optimizing images. Everyone loves a good image because it can add something special to your story and make a positive impression on readers. I like using them to add humor to my posts and visually describe what my post is about.

Three sleeping kittens

I’ll use the image above to illustrate good ways to optimize your images. By the way, I love cats, just like I love movies, and that’s why I’m using a picture of kittens. If you put your mouse over the image, you’ll see a caption pop up that says “Three kittens from the same litter snuggle together for a nap.” That is the image title or caption.

If you right-click the photo and hit the “Properties” button, you’ll find additional information that is used by search engines, like Google, MSN and Yahoo, to “see” what is in the images. Search engines are blind, so you have to spell out exactly what is contained in an image for them to notice it. One way I optimized this image for search engines is by providing alt text, which appears when the image does not load properly. This helps people who are unable to see the image to know exactly what it is, and it also helps search engines at the same time. By adding relevant, succinct alt text, like “Three sleeping kittens,” you are that much closer to optimizing your image.

The location of the file is www.eharborinc.com/blog/images/2009/0
2/sleeping_kittens.jpg. There are a number of lessons to learn from this file name and location. The file is in a specific folder that is meant only for eHarbor Blog photos. If every image’s file was located in a different place, it would be more difficult for search engines to go through and find them. It’s much better to have a good organizational system in place.

Most of the files we use in this blog are in JPEG format, but you can also use GIF, PNG or BMP to store your images. I find that JPEG is effective for my purposes, but each format has its own strengths and weaknesses, so you should pick and choose the format as your needs change. Also, keep the name short and simple. Don’t use generic names like “Image1.” I used “sleeping_kittens” because that pretty well describes the image.

This is the third part of this series. We’ll cover several other ways to achieve SEO in upcoming blog entries. Check out Google’s SEO Starter Guide for more information on this topic. The photo of the kittens is from Flickr and it is the copyright of Gúnna.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Ecommerce, Real Estate, SEO, Search Engines | 14 Comments »

Step 2 to topping Google: Add Web page titles

Tuesday, February 17th, 2009

By Robert Lockard

Welcome to part 2 of our multi-part series on great search engine optimization practices.

Do you see that blue line on the top of your browser that has the Internet Explorer or Firefox logo in the left corner? That’s called the head tag. Do you ever read the text in that line? Search engines love reading that text, which is called the tag title. In fact, what is written on that line is typically what shows up in the main line of Google searches. For that reason, it is absolutely essential that you write relevant, keyword-focused titles for each Web page.

Confusing signs pointing in opposite directions

Here’s an example: If you look up “eHarbor Inc” on Google you will discover the following words in the first line of the first search result: Search Engine Marketing - E-Harbor, Inc. - Home. That is exactly what is at the top of the eHarbor, Inc. home page. It’s good to include the name of your company at the top of each Web page, as well as a brief description of the services you offer or what is on that page.

Content on your website needs to be king if you want to gain repeat traffic, but Web page titles are also essential to help customers find your website in the first place on Google, Yahoo or MSN.

Here are some tips for creating titles for your Web pages:

- Use words that accurately and succinctly describe what is on the page.

- Don’t use too many words, even if they all describe the page’s content. Brevity is often the mark of a great writer!

- Don’t stuff the titles with keywords. Use words that clearly explain the content of the page, but don’t use every word that could possibly describe it.

- Avoid generic terms or simple numbering schemes on your pages, like “Page 1,” “Page 2” and so on.

This is the second part of this series. We’ll discuss optimizing images in the next blog entry on search engine optimization. Be sure to come back to the eHarbor Blog often for updates. Much of the information found in this blog entry comes from Google’s SEO Starter Guide. The photo of the confusing signs is from Flickr and it is the copyright of aturkus.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Ecommerce, SEO, Search Engines, eHarbor | 13 Comments »

« Older Entries