My good friend, and excellent Charlotte, NC realtor, John Paul Soto and I were talking a few nights ago. A good discussion came up about how to get listed higher in Google’s rankings for various search terms. This conversation echoed many I have had with our clients over the years. In fact, I would probably rate this concern as our number one small business web marketing question.
Since it is always such a big question for small business owners I thought I might use a few blog posts to give you Google’s own advice for improving your own search engine rankings.
First, the what not to do. This will help you know where Google draws the line so you know what is recommended and what is not.
Your Own Litmus Test
Google provides a few rules of thumb to help you if you are ever left wondering what is right and what is wrong. Ask yourself these three guiding questions:
- [Do you] feel comfortable explaining what you’ve done to a website that competes with you?
- Does this help [your] users?
- Would [you] do this if search engines didn’t exist?
The Recommendations
Here are some suggestions on what to avoid:
Google’s General Guidelines
- Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines. Don’t deceive your users or present different content to search engines than you display to users, which is commonly referred to as “cloaking.”
- Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings.
- Don’t participate in link schemes designed to increase your site’s ranking or PageRank. In particular, avoid links to web spammers or “bad neighborhoods” on the web, as your own ranking may be affected adversely by those links.
- Don’t use unauthorized computer programs to submit pages, check rankings, etc. Such programs consume computing resources and violate our Terms of Service. Google does not recommend the use of products such as WebPosition Gold?Ñ¢ that send automatic or programmatic queries to Google.
From Google’s webmaster guidelines
Google’s Specific Guidelines
- Avoid hidden text or hidden links.
- Don’t use cloaking or sneaky redirects.
- Don’t load pages with irrelevant keywords.
- Don’t create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with substantially duplicate content.
- Avoid “doorway” pages created just for search engines, or other “cookie cutter” approaches such as affiliate programs with little or no original content.
From Google’s webmaster guidelines
Check back later to read about Google’s recommendations for what you can do to help improve your rankings.
The “do not cross the line” photo is courtesy of Rob Gallop on Flickr
I'm looking for an online presence, not a ranking.
I would argue that part of your online presence includes being easily found on search engines (i.e. Google, Yahoo). If that is the case, then rankings are a valuable element of solid web marketing campaign.
With that said, I do not think rankings are the ultimate factor that some companies make them, but being found on search engines are another valuable tool in your arsenal.
Thoughts?
Not sure if you saw Seth Godin's post on this similiar topic today…http://tinyurl.com/c68jpv
Nope, I had not caught up on my reading for the day. I think Seth makes some valid points and I agree. I think that for a lot of search terms you are going to fail to break into the top ten; however, why should that prevent you from writing your pages and blog posts with SEO in mind?
Does it really take that much extra effort to write "web marketing" versus "marketing" or leave it omitted completely? Furthermore, it does take some search engine knowledge to get Seth's "white page" method to work.
Take one of Seth's examples. David Meerman Scott uses his middle name. Why? Well if you ask him, it is because there were already a few David Scotts that already had the market on his name. So, David, with his great knowledge of SEO began using his middle name so he would have a better chance of showing up on Google.
First came his knowledge of search engines, then came the decision to use his middle name; not reverse.
Finally, my hope in providing this (and the next few) Google post(s) will be to try and get people to understand that there is more to search engine rankings than just keywords and "schemes." It takes getting involved in the online community, creating good products/services, and writing helpful and useful content.
Thanks for the good conversation, Jim! I am enjoying the discussion.
I am the Commenting Ninja!
Haha, that you are.
Here's the result for Beacon Hill NWhttp://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Beacon+Hill+…
That is awesome! You have definitely grabbed that term. Great job.
I have had a bit of a battle over the past few years with a clothing company out of France. We both have the name "Triune Designs." They held on to the top spot initially because of their excellent use of links to their site on Etsy and MySpace.
We have finally taken over the top spot after years of solid efforts in the web marketing community.
Have you used Google's webmaster tool? I check it out to see what random search terms Google pulls up for my website. Some are quite random and I have to laugh.
Hey Leo, Thanks for this great information… I always hear different information about what google likes! I am looking forward for you next blog on this subject and I will pass this on to my co-workers. Realtors need to know this!
(Thanks for the nice comment about me!)
Yeah, it is always nice to hear something straight from the source. I constantly hear rumors or wrong advice and I thought some posts like this would help clear up some misunderstandings and help people do what is best.
No problem on the comment; you do a great job.
Have a great evening.
Pingback: Web marketing thoughts for small businesses » Google’s advice? Get more links