To keep its search results relevant and free of spam, Google introduced its latest update Google Penguin. With each update introduced by Google, websites should be optimized to get rid of spam and continue ranking well in SERPs. Every update developed by Google is aimed at maintaining its monopoly by providing relevant SERPs that are useful, informative and spam free.

While Google’s opinion of spam continues to vary over the years, it has done an excellent job of providing helpful content to internet users. With the advent of Google Penguin, website owners should pay attention to certain aspects of their website.

What websites should avoid

Google’s webspam teams led by Matt Cutts and Google Webmaster Tools have marked certain guidelines for websites to follow with the aim of eliminating spam from search results.

If you are genuinely optimizing your website for larger audiences, you should consider ways in which you can improve user experience and add more value to your website. You should also be able to acquire a loyal customer base and retain them for a long time. Some websites resort to tricks as they are not concerned about visitors and only want to make quick money. Others may have been misguided when adopting the following practices, now labeled as spam by Google.

Purchasing links to improve page rank is a clear no-no as it does not allow genuinely helpful pages to rank well. Websites cannot setup different pages for users and search engines or include hidden links, text and doorway pages. Redirects or cloaking are also a red flag with the latest Google Penguin update.

Immediate crisis management: A few essential checks

The first step in managing your website is to assess the damage done through analytics. Check your recent web analytics stats for the last thirty days to get a sense of how Google Penguin or any other update has affected your website traffic. If you have lost significant traffic from Google, you should check the organic keyword referrer report for the last 30 days to determine which keywords have lost most traffic. You should also manually check your website rankings by inserting the top 5-6 keywords.

To determine if your website was affected specifically by Google Penguin, you can log into your webmaster account in Google Webmaster Central. Contact the Google webspam team if you believe your website was incorrectly targeted. Use link tools and redirect tools to check if your website is running smoothly.

Long term plans for in-house SEO

One of the first steps you should take while planning long term in-house SEO is to set up guidelines for all employees of your company to follow. Based on extensive research of SEO best practices, you should work towards maintaining the right balance of keywords without compromising on content quality and relevance.

You should also create a financial estimate of the revenue you lost because of Google Penguin. Provide clear guidelines to your company’s IT and SEO developers to steer clear of any potential spam activities. Monitor your links closely and ensure that you report any suspicious activity on your website to Google customer support immediately.

Related articles

• What You Ought to Do If You’ve Been Punished by Google’s Penguin Update (quicksprout.com)
• The Three Keys to Automotive SEO Under Penguin (topdealerseo.com)
• What If The Google Penguin Update Inadvertently Killed The Web As We Know It? (webpronews.com)
• Google Penguin Web Spam Algorithm Update Feedback Form Now Live (searchenginewatch.com)

There’s good and bad about speaking engagements in Vegas. The good part is that the city is ideal with plenty of hotel rooms and conference space to make anyone comfortable and productive. The bad part is that it’s Las “Stays In” Vegas and attendees are often distracted from the business at hand.

That won’t be the case at the PCG Event tomorrow through Thursday. The attendees are there for learning and the presenters are professionals. I have been to the previous two and both were high on education, low on distractions. The only bad part is that I won’t be posting much on Soshable for the time – Brian Pasch tends to keep everybody pretty busy during his events even if we’re lucky enough to skip out on the 6am exercise program.

I’ll be discussing “SEO Techniques that Leverage the Latest Changes in Google’s Search Algorithm” that covers the Penguin update. It’s arguably the most important speaking engagement topic I’ve had this year.

KPA will have a strong presence at the event and is doing SEO Snapshots for those interested in consultations. With many of the attendees being PCG clients, we don’t expect to see too many bad things going on with the search engine optimization, but not everyone is with PCG so there will definitely be some who need help. We’re ready.

For Soshable visitors – see you Friday! Vegas, I’ll see you in the morning.

When you have a small business, chances are that you will not pay attention to a social marketing aspect known as search engine optimization or SEO. The concept of SEO is ideal for small businesses as they usually cater to specialized niches.

As these businesses do not have the hassle of bureaucratic interference, they can adapt to change, connect and respond to their consumer base easily. Although, search engine optimization can be done within the company, it is a smart idea to hire a SEO company as they will offer you specialized skills and technical know-how. The following are the key points of search engine optimization.

What is SEO?

Search engine optimization is the art of increasing visitor traffic to your website or page by enhancing its ranking in search engine lists. This is carried out by creating and developing the content in a manner that will be easily picked up by search engines. Identifying and inserting keywords in to the content is one of the popular methods of search engine optimization.

Another technique is to construct links from authority websites to your website or page so that it is easily identified by popular search engines. Specialists from a SEO company will pay attention to both these techniques.

Benefits of SEO

Implementing good SEO strategies have a number of benefits. Here are a few of them.

• It is a cost-effective marketing tool. Small businesses usually have limited resources. When compared to the advertising and promotional costs that will be incurred while using print and visual media, SEO is the less expensive option. You will receive and enjoy the marketing benefits without exceeding the company budget.
• Using SEO techniques enhances the ranking of your website or page in search engine lists. Hiring a SEO company will ensure that popular search engines will identify and place your website near the top of the list.
• Search engine optimization will help to improve the visibility and awareness of your business.
• SEO increases the visitor traffic to your website or page as it becomes more visible to internet users.
• The main benefit of using SEO strategies is that it provides flexibility. The factors that affect search engine optimization are constantly changing. SEO specialists can modify your website as and when it is required.

On-site and Off-site SEO

SEO strategies can be implemented in two ways – on-site and off-site. On-site SEO refers to the changes that are made in the content. Identifying and inserting relevant keywords in suitable places of the content is the main on-site SEO technique.

While keywords are a crucial factor, it is also important to develop useful and well-written content. Off-site SEO is carried out by constructing links from the established websites relevant to your business to your website or page. This will help popular search engines to find your site quickly and feature it near the top of the search engine list.

SEO is the premium way to ensure visibility and visitor traffic to your company’s website. As the World Wide Web can reach a large and diverse audience, it can be a smart option to hire a SEO company to promote the image and products of a small business.

Related articles

• A Short Guide To Search Engine Optimization (ronmedlin.com)
• 3 Top Tips to Reach Top Ranking (websudasa.com)
• Become More Visible On The Web With These Search Engine Optimization Tips (ronmedlin.com)

This particular video covers the automotive industry but it can be applied to anyone. Search engine optimization is so shrouded in mystery sometimes that sifting through what’s real and what’s “smoke and mirrors” sold by “snake oil salesmen” can be a challenge. The pitches have a tendency to sound the same.

When looking at providers, here are the three things to ask about:

1. Requisites – What do they do? How do they do it? Oddly enough, this is the least important of the criteria as they normally end up saying just about the same thing over and over again regardless of the providers, but it’s important to see if they sound like they know what they’re talking about.
2. Results – This is easy. Get examples. Then, get more examples. A good SEO provider will have more than one or two examples of their successes with keywords.
3. Returns – ROI is the most important aspect of selecting any marketing program. If it doesn’t return, it isn’t worth it. Have them put pen to paper and demonstrate how they can move the needle on your bottom line.

Here’s the video as it pertains to Automotive SEO.

Unless you’ve been in a coma for a while, you’ve probably noticed that the past few years of global Internet use have changed the game of marketing completely. These days, a consumer can immediately find a page for something the consumer likes—which is great for anyone selling anything.

Lots of big companies have capitalized on this, and huge changes have come in the world of marketing and advertising within the last five years. Take a look at:

Networking.

In October of 2007, Microsoft bought a 1.6% share in Facebook, back when it was worth a lowly $15 billion. Just two years after Microsoft’s investment, Facebook reported that its value had increased to $41 billion…not a bad turnaround. The website has become a must-have for every social creature and was the world’s most visited site in 2011. Advertising on Facebook using its audience-targeting parameters may be the smartest thing a business can do nowadays.

Crowdfunding.

With the advent of sites like SliceThePie in 2007, IndieGoGo in 2008, and Kickstarter in 2009, it is no longer a question of which big guys back you in your enterprise—it’s all about support from the little guys. Need help financing your artistic venture? A couple of weeks ago, artist Rich Burlew, author of The Order of the Stick online comics, raised one-million-and-a-quarter dollars with the help of Kickstarter’s collection platform and donations from nearly 15,000 people. That’s impressive…and it’s available to anyone who can gather a decent following.

Searching.

As of 2011, Google had already bought Motorola, YouTube, and Keyhole, the small company providing the idea for the three-dimensional satellite imaging that became Google Earth. Shopping, language translation, sharing documents…Google does it all. My own blog benefits from searches on Google more than anything else, and optimizing your site for search engines—throwing in key words and phrases that are more likely to come up in a search—is a widely known practice.

Media.

YouTube’s popularity skyrocketed after being bought by Google in November of 2006. Google had the right idea. After all, images and video are what spur a curious online consumer into looking at something new. Plenty of other sites (i.e. Hulu, VEVO, Bing, Crackle) are offering video and movies to the masses. Subscription to a YouTube channel has become the bread and butter for many that are looking for notoriety, and it works!  You could use Justin Bieber as an example here, but I’d rather point in you in the direction of Chevy’s joint production of OK Go’s music video where a speeding car plays all the instruments. Really cool.

Mass Communications.

Networking and media aside, the ability to simply pick up a figurative Internet bullhorn and send a message that’s instantly readable by millions is, in a word, powerful. So it’s no surprise that Twitter’s ability to do so caught on quickly. A landmark achievement for Twitter? Try January 2010’s message tweeted by astronauts at the International Space Station. Now that is remarkable. If you’re trying to spread an idea, it would seem that no one is really out of your reach.

These advances in such a short period of time are great news. After all, if all of that happened in the last five years, the next five years ought to be promising, too.

Facebook is the New SEO Secret

Attracting traffic through Facebook is a relatively-new but effective technique. Here are some tips and ways to attract traffic for your Facebook page through search engine optimization.

Create a Fan Page

The traffic that you finally attract is going to be through your fan page on Facebook, not through the personal account that you have on it for mixing upon with your friends. So, to get started with search engine optimization through social media, make sure you have a fan page on Facebook or Twitter. Now that you have a fan page and people start visiting it, you should work on making the page “Sticky”, as experts put it.

Make sure you have interesting content and information that the visitors value. Also, ensure that the page is fun enough for the viewers that they “like” it. This liking activity is automatically notified to other contacts of the visitors and they would be directed to your fan page too. Now, from the fan page, the interesting content and information that you upload is meant to direct them to the website that you actually wanted to promote.

Be More Visible

Visit other people’s pages, write comments, like, and respond in any possible way as long as it is polite! This way more and more people will notice your presence and the probability of having more visitors would be greatly enhanced. So, every day, make sure you respond to other people’s pages and stay visible to viewers. Also, encourage interaction by :linking” people’s posts on your page, and commenting frequently to promote and reinforce this kind of interaction.

Manage Time

You need to spend about half the time that you spend on promotion of your website to your online marketing activities through social media. Come up with interesting stuff and keep posting it to your fan page. Be careful not to upload every single joke that you come across. You have to stay focused. You can definitely find relevant stuff that your readers will find interesting and “sticky”.

The other half you should spend updating the website you have created for your online business. Updating it regularly, posting fresh content is a great search engine optimization technique and Google loves this king of strategy rather than purchasing back links or posting spam to attract people.

Get Links

Another one of the ways to get more traffic for your Facebook page through search engine optimization is getting links. These would apply to Linked In as well as Twitter, My Space, Flicker and many others. Again, be careful as to the links should not be spam. Attempting to gain attention through spam, you only invite trouble. As soon as search engines find you attracting people through spam messages or spam links, your account will be terminated. Same can happen for your website; so act smart and do not go overboard.

Social media has become a much preferred way of attracting traffic to your business websites that classical back linking strategies. To keep the business going, make sure you modify your search engine optimization techniques and start attracting people through social media. It is time to go for the natural way of search engine optimization and making more money online.

The thing about marketing nowadays is that there are more options for small business owners who are looking for more customers to take a look at their products and services. There have been numerous theories and schools of thought dedicated to various methods of online marketing, all of which are quite effective in their own way. One of them is inbound marketing, and this one has its own set of advantages.

What is Inbound Marketing?

This thing called inbound marketing is a principle that puts together a set of online marketing techniques for attracting page views to your website. Instead of having to charge them for whatever they can get for free online anyway, you can use this to get a good clue on what the people are looking for, then address those demands and concerns. In essence, you let the people come in and do a lot of the work for you.

It requires planning and preparation though since marketing is not exactly witchcraft. You make use of different methods like search engine optimization, content marketing, conversion rate optimization, and social media marketing in order to get your own little corner of the web to more people out there. Inbound marketing is basically a collective term that encompasses methods that bring the people in, hence the name.

Cost of inbound marketing

The good thing about inbound marketing is that it costs little to nothing at all, making it an ROI-focused strategy that anyone who’s willing enough can learn. The goal in itself is to make your website more visible so that more people can get to your products and services. If you do well enough, there will be people who can find out about your business and become your customers in the process if you have what they want at a good enough price.

Tapping the online market

A big part of inbound marketing fundamentals is the use of search engines, mainly Google. With three billion search queries per day, an ocean of possibilities is right there for online marketers everywhere to take advantage of. A good chunk of that can be your target market, so all you have to do is to make your website visible enough for that niche to take notice, then give them what they want when they do come in. But first, you have to make your website visible to them.

Marketing your website

Content and blog marketing can help increase web traffic by a half more on average. Four times the number of your pages can be indexed by search engines by marketing your site and content properly, increasing chances of having your website discovered by potential customers. Social media can also help you get more exposure, especially since more and more people are now logging on to social media websites like Facebook and Twitter. It also helps with interacting with customers, which is a good way to keep things going smoothly.

Beyond marketing

Through inbound marketing, you can increase your revenue and help you know more about how to improve your business. Soon enough, you’ll see that it can become more than just marketing, but also a way to become a better entrepreneur as a result since you become more connected with your customers. It can also help build relationships with fellow entrepreneurs who are doing the same thing with inbound marketing. The resulting exchange of information can be very beneficial indeed.

Having control over marketing your brand

Also, since you do most of the work yourself with inbound marketing, it means that you can dictate what image you are putting out to the public. In traditional marketing, you would be a client of a public relations firm, which then decides on how they will market your brand. Perhaps you can get what you pay for through that route, but the only time when you can express how you want it done is during consultation. Otherwise, you’ll have to trust the fate of your brand in the hands of others. While they are more skilled in traditional marketing, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out online inbound marketing at all.

By putting the reins of your brand’s marketing in your own hands, you can be sure that everything that is being put out for the sake of your brand is to the beat of your own drum. Not only is it a more sensible way to do business, but you also can get more involved with the marketing of your products and services, which is a good thing when long term goals are to be considered. In the end, you get more ROI and other gains as a result of inbound marketing.

Many in the social media industry got started from search marketing. In early 2007, many in the SEO world started noticing the benefits that social held over the various search algorithms and gave it a look. From there, a lot of them were hooked.

Despite a toning-down of social media links as credible sources for link-authority, there has been a rise of other social signals that both Google and Bing explore. Both are looking to Twitter and Facebook amongst other smaller ones despite Google not renewing with the Twitter firehose and Facebook’s relationship with Microsoft. Google+ is having a clear and tangible effect on search.

Here’s a quick video with some car dealer SEO tips.

A Google+ update sent out by internet entrepreneur and FamilyLink.com founder Paul Allen hints there may be another reason to keep an eye on the recently launched Search Plus Your World. According to the post, Google looks to be indexing web content faster for users who are logged in to its social network than those who are not.

Allen says that while signed into the site, his post was indexed and already displayed in the search results within less than a minute. This was versus about 20 minutes for the post to appear for users who were not logged in.

Google’s new Search Plus Your World indexing your content faster is a huge perk as far as SEO goes. The timeliness of content on the web is more important than ever, and the faster you can get it to your audience, the better. It is essentially near real-time when considering that your content is made available in the results almost instantaneously.

This latest discovery appears to be a part of Google’s initiative to put greater emphasis on recency. Last fall, the search giant rolled out its freshness update, which aimed to showcase the most recently published material and was said to effect as much as 35% of the results.

Your World Through Google’s Eyes

For those who are not familiar, Google Search Plus Your World is a feature that serves up results that are more personalized and relevant to the user. The company is taking the recency concept even further with Search Plus Your World, and Google+ is the key piece of the puzzle. In order to get their hands on these enhanced results, the user must have the feature turned on, and more importantly, be logged into their account.

Apart from the possible faster indexing of content, Google Search Plus Your World basically consists of three components:

1. Personal Results – With Personal Results, the user can find information that is personally relevant to them. This could be content such as updates or photos they uploaded, or content that was shared with them by friends.

2. Profiles in Search – This component applies to both the standard results, and those that are displayed via Google’s Autocomplete feature. In a nutshell, Profiles in Search makes it possible for a user to easily find people in their circles or others they may want to follow on the site.

3. People and Pages – Hence the name, People and Pages enables the user to find people (by their profiles) and pages that are related to specific area they are interested in. Once a user finds a profile or page that interests them, they can follow it a few quick clicks.

It is important to note that Google has not confirmed whether or not it is indexing content faster for Google+ users, but that looks to be the case. If so, it could be another point for the argument of Search Plus Your World being the company’s biggest search update ever.

SEO is one of the most effective methods for increasing visibility and  boosting traffic online. And with Google the being undisputed king of  the online search game, its ranking system is the one most publishers and marketers aim to please with their SEO efforts. However, many have found that keeping up with the company’s ever changing algorithm can be a full time job in and of itself.

If you’re among those who feel this way, brace yourself because the advent of the Google +1 button could lead to one of the biggest changes yet.

The +1 Button’s Potential Impact on Search Rankings

Since rolling out the +1 button in the spring of 2011, it was apparent  that Google had big plans for the feature that instantly drew comparisons to the Facebook Like button. What became clear was the search giant’s ambitions of using it as a measure of good content and ordering rankings in the results pages. According to a recent article published by technology news site Wired, it has now been confirmed that Google will indeed use the +1 button as a tool that helps it organize rankings and weed out search engine spam, a problem the company and its competitors have been fighting for some time.

In order to get an idea of where the Google +1 button stands in terms of importance, one must first understand how it works. Remember, this feature is quite similar to what Facebook has going on with its Like button, so the best way to describe it is a convenient method for giving a piece of content your stamp of approval, an endorsement if you will. Slowly but surely, the +1 button has been making its rounds throughout the web. In fact, you may have noticed it more often in the search results and on web pages alongside buttons from Facebook, Twitter, and other sites.

The Wired story featured quotes from a Google spokesperson, who states that the company will not only be studying +1 button clicks in regard to influencing rankings and the order of results, but also as a measure of overall quality. Judging from the spokesperson’s comments and what has already been speculated for months now, it is starting to look like webmasters may need to tally up a certain number of clicks if they want to enjoy a comfortable spot in the rankings. From this perspective, the +1 button could become one of the many crucial factors that help determine PageRank, which would make it extremely important for obvious reasons.

Another Step in the Evolution of Search

To be clear, Google is not doing away with its PageRank system. Instead, it appears to be using the +1 button to improve that system and the quality of the results it delivers to the searcher. Above all, it looks like another step in the evolution that has seen search become more personal and relevant right before our very eyes.