Thu, 29 Mar 2007 16:39:24 by Hannah Parker
Joe chatted earlier this month about his favourite keyword analysis tool which is Keyword Discovery. Big problem with this one is that you have to pay to use it :(
If you want to have a play with some free keyword tools - these are what I think are the best free ones on the net at the moment:
http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/Overture has something to do with ...Read More.
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Wed, 28 Mar 2007 18:58:44 by Matt Hopkins
When analysing a website to ensure that it is “search engine friendly”, one of the tools that is essential for any search engine optimiser is a broken links report.
As you know, the internet is built on the concept of links. To view any page on your website or any other website, you start from a link.
When a search engine spider arrives at your website to retrieve...Read More.
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Tue, 27 Mar 2007 14:28:28 by Hannah Parker
This is a quick HTML one.
If you are creating a form in a webpage which has the action of going off to another page and potentially querying a server side database, there are 2 form methods you might use. These methods are "Get" and "Post".
The "Get" method encodes the form data into the URL and the "Post" method puts the form data into the message body.
If you want a search engine t...Read More.
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Mon, 26 Mar 2007 16:48:56 by Pete Handley
I have been trying to look at a number of sites link popularity across a number of search engines, and found that it was not possible to get a figure from www.live.com today.
It wasn't like it didn't return results, it just wasn't able to finish loading the page and caused my browser to crash, which was rather frustrating after the 3rd attempt
After researching this a bit further it seems...Read More.
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Mon, 26 Mar 2007 14:23:09 by Hannah Parker
I've updated the SEO/M Quiz - it's now got 25 questions.
http://www.vertical-leap.co.uk/seo-quiz/seo-quiz.asp
Test yourself...
Hannah ParkerCampaign Delivery Manager...Read More.
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Mon, 26 Mar 2007 10:00:59 by Cameron Winslow
Too often businesses come to an SEO company expecting them to solve all their business issues. “Get me number one” and “Double my traffic” are phrases we hear every day that are goals of business for an SEO company to achieve.
One of the most important factors of a new Client is to understand their business and sometimes assist the Client in...Read More.
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Mon, 26 Mar 2007 09:20:58 by Matt Hopkins
Here’s a quick Monday morning tip.
In Google, if you type in “movie:” followed by the name of the film you are looking for, Google will provide you with a list of cinemas and show times where the film is showing. For example:
Movie:Ghost Rider
It will try to “guess” your location by your IP address, but you can also append your nearest t...Read More.
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Sun, 25 Mar 2007 20:20:05 by Matt Hopkins
When describing the keywords associated with a campaign here at Vertical Leap we use two different terms - “benchmark keywords” and “attracted keywords”.
When optimising a site for a particular set of keywords, it would be virtually impossible to determine ALL of the possible keywords that may be used when searching for our client’s products or service...Read More.
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Fri, 23 Mar 2007 14:39:11 by Joe Ogden
Hi Guys,
I came across this 'interesting' video after watching Matt Cutts clips (U Tube) and then typing 'SEO' in the search field to see what it would throw up.
It's an interesting idea and certainly would 'revolutionise' search as we know it, first thing springs to mind is that rank checking could be interesting ;-)
I’m thinking this type of 'search' is a little way...Read More.
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Fri, 23 Mar 2007 10:00:33 by Hannah Parker
Google have recently launched a beta version of PPA (Pay Per Action) ads in the US. This is a rather smart idea that means that the advertiser only pays when a specified action is completed. It's an attempt to counter affiliate schemes and click fraud. The rather sneaky thing is that they've allowed the ads to be more discretely disguised within the content of the site:
"Text links a...Read More.
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Thu, 22 Mar 2007 15:26:35 by Hannah Parker
A bit like Sitelinks - I've also been asked whether there is anything we can do to encourage results to appear in a multiple section SERPs layout... A bit like this example for "tokenizer" taken from a Webmasterworld thread:
And the answer is......
No.
Sorry.
Matt Cutts wrote about it back in August 2005 - it's Google trying out algorithms and trying to be usef...Read More.
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Thu, 22 Mar 2007 13:32:16 by Pete Handley
There isn't a day that goes by, when I don't have to make use of a content management system of some sort. I come across them in my working life,as a number of campaigns that I work on have some sort of system to make changes on a website, but I also come across them in my personal life, as although it is not billed as one, the interface where changes are made to ones myspace profile is also anoth...Read More.
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Thu, 22 Mar 2007 01:20:40 by Mary-Ann Dick
For anyone interested in learning how many people globally use search engines, Nielson/NetRatings recently released some interesting search statistics, and here is a snippet:
256m people globally, visited a search engine in December 2006 ? representing 81% of global internet users.
The global search audience has grown by 10% over the last year, while the total Internet audience...Read More.
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Wed, 21 Mar 2007 03:36:26 by Jayson Munday
Latent semantic indexing (LSI), what is it? What?s all the hype about? Well I can tell you, LSI looks like it?s the way all the search engines will be heading. Latent semantic indexing examines the context of the words on your page, for example if you searched for Paris Hilton, the search engines know you are talking about the lady famous for just being famous, instead of a city ...Read More.
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Tue, 20 Mar 2007 19:58:58 by Matt Hopkins
I read somewhere that 37% of men and 21% of women are "commitment-phobic" – they turn and run at any sign of an enduring relationship. As with all things these days, I started to think about this in the terms of search engine marketing.
Search engine optimisation (SEO) typically represents only 10% of the total annual spend on search ...Read More.
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Tue, 20 Mar 2007 09:52:37 by Matt Hopkins
I just watched an interesting screencast introduction to Yahoo’s new OneSearch technology - http://h.yimg.com/download.yahoo.com/dl/yodel/onesearch/yahoo.swf.
It looks like a great implementation and they are really considering the mobile phone user and his specific needs - rather than simply delivering "web search" on a mobile phone.
The main difference is that when you ...Read More.
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Mon, 19 Mar 2007 22:45:29 by Mary-Ann Dick
I dont know if anyone else has come across this point and click search engine relationships chart.
http://www.search-this.com/search-engine-decoder/
It provides clients with a graphic representation of the various search engines and their relationships to one another and if you click on "Nielsen Ratings" shows you how much market share each search engine has.
Mar...Read More.
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Mon, 19 Mar 2007 21:49:57 by Jessica Faltot
Is it any wonder that business owners are skeptical about the ROI for search engine optimization? When we talk about ROI for Vertical Leap's fully managed search engine marketing and how we step up and take responsibility for getting results, the skepticism begins to turn into hope.
In the past, web development companies and web design firms viewed SEO as an add-on service.&n...Read More.
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Mon, 19 Mar 2007 09:15:18 by Matt Hopkins
I read a great little white paper by Sean D’Souza from Psychotactics Ltd (New Zealand) recently on why some headlines fail and I highly recommend that you read it as soon as you can.
This paper discusses the psychological “triggers” that make people act when they see a certain headline ? for us, this means a click. I believe that these tips can be applied equally...Read More.
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Sat, 17 Mar 2007 15:16:44 by Matt Hopkins
I'm a big fan of Skype - the Voice Over IP (VOIP) provider that was acquired for mega-bucks by EBay not so long ago. In their most recent version of their product (3.1), they have added a new feature / service called SkypeFind.
SkypeFind is a business directory of the social networking/media variety - businesses are easily added ...Read More.
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Fri, 16 Mar 2007 10:12:36 by Joe Ogden
I know I know, it's only been a couple of days and already Joe has returned to this hub of SEO knowledge to deposit another pearl of wisdom to unsuspecting readers of this fine blog, but well here I am, here is a neat little trick for excluding supplemental results from Google SERPs, just type into Googles search box:
site:www.yoursite.com -allinurl:www.yoursite.com
This command ...Read More.
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Fri, 16 Mar 2007 02:08:15 by Jayson Munday
As our world gets faster, people become more and more inclined to shortcut everything in their lives. There literally aren’t enough hours in the day. This fact of our modern world has spilled over into the way people connect through the web.On average people read their screens approximately 25% slower than they would traditional media. So guess what, you’re lucky if someone reads al...Read More.
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Thu, 15 Mar 2007 14:15:46 by Hannah Parker
There is a strategy called "link baiting" which is basically all about trying to put something interesting on your site that people will link to naturally. Matt Cutts defines link bait as anything "interesting enough to catch people's attention". It might also attract interest on the Social Network in sites like del.icio.us which can give your site a big traffic boost. Furthermore it's quite likel...Read More.
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Wed, 14 Mar 2007 16:31:13 by Hannah Parker
A rather nifty, speedy way of seeing if a page is getting the message across that you intend, is the "Adsense Preview Tool". Google's Adsense looks at the content of the page and displays adverts that are appropriate to the theme of the page.
It is intended for use by webpages which are thinking of adding Google Adsense ads to their site. It is an addition to the right click menu for IE 6x whi...Read More.
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Wed, 14 Mar 2007 16:16:36 by Pete Handley
I've read a few articles recently about Googles newly launched AJAX driven Directory on Google China.
AJAX applications, as I understand them are created using Javascript which the search engines can't read.
Normally, this would be where everyone starts crying "No - Don't Do It!", however with Matt Cutts recently talking about how search results should be kept out of the Google SERP...Read More.
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Wed, 14 Mar 2007 14:17:19 by Joe Ogden
?Hark? I hear you say, ?Is that Joe back from his travels??, well yes actually fresh out of the keyword research wilderness with some great news about streamlining keyword research, ?oooooh? I hear you say (like the ?ooo? people use when watching fireworks) ?do tell us about it Joe?. Well ok I will:
My keyword tool of preference is without a doubt Keyword Discovery; it has a couple ...Read More.
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Wed, 14 Mar 2007 08:00:56 by Matt Hopkins
When it comes to the regional versions of the search engines (e.g. Google.co.uk, Google.com.au, Yahoo7.com.au, etc), there are a few attributes that are taken into account relating to geography. Some of these include:
1. Does your site have a regional domain name – this usually signifies that you are targeting a more “local” audience?&nb...Read More.
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Mon, 12 Mar 2007 22:02:23 by Matt Hopkins
Google is always trying to improve the relevance of its search results and to do that, they have to tweak their algorithm (or at least threaten to change it). It looks like the current focus is with web pages that are nothing more than search results themselves.
For example, if you search in Google for “plasma televisions” you’ll notice that several of the ...Read More.
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Mon, 12 Mar 2007 19:15:36 by Matt Hopkins
It's always sad to see clients leave our service and although it doesn't happen often, it does happen and for a variety of reasons.
Sometimes the client is having budget constraints. A few clients have actually gone out of business (unfortunately solid SEO does not solve a flawed business model). And a few get frustrated with the timescales involved with a&nb...Read More.
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Mon, 12 Mar 2007 16:01:49 by Pete Handley
Anyone who has done a search for almost anything on Google, is almost guaranteed to have seen at least one entry for a Wikipedia item. The frequency that the Wikipedia appears for a great number of different types of search query is truly amazing.
I started using the Wikipedia when I was studying at University, as it was a great free resource to begin research from. Frustratingly, because of t...Read More.
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Mon, 12 Mar 2007 04:46:01 by Jayson Munday
Linking is often said to be a crucial part of your SEO campaign. Although we see the importance of this strategy, nearly everyone gets it wrong. So what makes a successful linking building campaign? Who should you be linking to, and probably even more importantly who should you let link to you? These questions have been asked time and time again by anyone who has been trying to promote their web...Read More.
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Sun, 11 Mar 2007 23:27:49 by Mary-Ann Dick
You have a great idea, you have selected your domain name and are in the process of briefing your Web Design Company on the type of website you are looking for.
One of the fundamental questions you really should ask your Web Design Company at this point is ?Will my site be Search Engine Friendly??
Your website certainly needs to be appealing to the potential cu...Read More.
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Sun, 11 Mar 2007 21:52:50 by Mary-Ann Dick
The 5 Leading Search Categories in 2006 were:
Dining/Recreation
Jokes/Riddles
Ring Tones/Pictures
News/Stock
Weather Forecast
When optimising for mobile, the golden rules to remember are:
Less is more (ensure your content is uncluttered and clear to the end user)
Page Size must be small (fast loading)
Keep the des...Read More.
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Fri, 9 Mar 2007 16:22:39 by Hannah Parker
Add a Google map to your site. It's soooo easy.
First you need to get A Google Maps API key.
This API is valid for use on your domain. It gives you a snippet of code that you can insert into your web page. Even BBC is at it
The snippet centres the map based on latitude and longitude so you have to find the lat & long for your postcode... You can do this by going to: http://maps.goo...Read More.
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Thu, 8 Mar 2007 14:14:29 by Jessica Faltot
Caveat emptor - Let the buyer beware has taken on a new meaning when it comes to selecting a search engine marketing company to handle your organic search campaign. More often than not, companies who are interested in Vertical Leap's managed search marketing services come to us after having been burnt or severely disappointed by other companies who sold them a bill of goods and delivere...Read More.
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Thu, 8 Mar 2007 13:31:56 by Rebecca Ratliff
So how important are the keywords selected for a company's search engine marketing campaign? Optimization starts with good keyword selection, carefully focused to the conversion goals of the site. Achieve great rankings for the wrong keywords and it doesn't matter how much traffic your company receives from their SEO campaign because visitors will be leavi...Read More.
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Thu, 8 Mar 2007 13:17:57 by Hannah Parker
Sometimes it seems webmasters are reluctant to link to other sites. They are concerned about leaking PageRank or taking visitors away from their site. Thing is I really think this kind of defeats the point of hypertext links and the Internet in general. It's got to make your site more useful to your visitors if you've got some quality outbound links to authority sites.
If you're asking about "...Read More.
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Thu, 8 Mar 2007 02:04:25 by Jayson Munday
Does it sound right? Should I jam some more keywords in? These are the questions that I’m sure anyone who has ever written some content for SEO have asked themselves. The problem is there is real no real set rule on the answer, and believe the answer will probably vary between every good search marketer.Although there are no set rules on this area of search engine optimization, there are s...Read More.
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Thu, 8 Mar 2007 01:27:46 by Jayson Munday
The first ever Australian Search Summit was held last week, on the 1st and 2nd of March. It was the first of its kind here down under, and pulled a large and expansive audience, with the majority of the crowd coming from SEO and marketing backgrounds. The summit also drew some great international speakers, my personal favourite being the highly renowned Andy Beal. There was also a rare questions...Read More.
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Thu, 8 Mar 2007 01:25:08 by Cameron Winslow
Some of the Vertical Leap Australia Team just returned from a Search Summit conference in Sydney put on by Barry Smyth. One aspect of SEO we have been stressing is the increased effectiveness of blogging which was further reinforced during the conference.
Here is an interesting article on blogging from Trevor Cook that was written in 2005. The article predicts that blogging will be...Read More.
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Wed, 7 Mar 2007 16:23:51 by Hannah Parker
You know when you do a search - say for something like "Edinburgh Crystal" in Google and get results that look something like this:
With the #1 result being the most relevant site - and then a lot of pages inset slightly from the same domain...
Well this is called "sitelinks". Google named this feature in Sept 2006 though its been around for longer.
The unfortunate thing is that&n...Read More.
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Wed, 7 Mar 2007 13:23:22 by Pete Handley
I have dabbled with the Mobile Internet over the last few years and feel that it is really starting to get somewhere after a slow growth period.
Previously I had only used the Mobile web for checking train times when I was on the move, or for making sure that my team has won that vital match that I missed while I was working.
Now though, that has all changed. With my new phone, I can now r...Read More.
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Tue, 6 Mar 2007 16:16:15 by Hannah Parker
Hmmm. There is lots of talk about different penalties in Google - there is a -30 penalty, OOP (Over Optimisation Penalty) or the new -950 penalty. The buzz about the 950 penalty is that it hits over optimised sites - sites that have a keyword used too frequently in the anchor text for links, keywords at the top and bottom of a page and all the usual malarky.
Its all kinda interesting - and if...Read More.
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Fri, 2 Mar 2007 16:48:48 by Matt Hopkins
This is a great and well-presented YouTube video trying to set the stage for Web 2.0 - things are changing (again) and we'll try to ensure that the impact on search engine marketing in the context of the web is also discussed on this blog over the coming months.
But for now - watch this:
Matt HopkinsManaging Director...Read More.
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Fri, 2 Mar 2007 14:02:02 by Hannah Parker
Talking of Google's "OneBox" - it's amazing what you can actually sell on Google Base. You can advertise job vacancies for starters:
You can even sell yourself under its personals!
Hannah ParkerCampaign Delivery Manager...Read More.
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Fri, 2 Mar 2007 10:06:54 by Pete Handley
Tracking traffic levels on a regular basis allows you to examine traffic trends, and lets you see whether work you have done has had a quantifiable effect on the customers that are brought to a website.
However, reviewing traffic levels on a monthly basis can be frustrating. Don't get me wrong, I do think that this is a good time period to review traffic levels, as it allows you to break down ...Read More.
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Fri, 2 Mar 2007 08:35:11 by Matt Hopkins
Most people are aware of the two main areas on Google?s search engine results pages ? the natural or organic listings shown in the main body of the page on the left-hand side and the ?paid for? or sponsored listings down the right (and sometimes in a box at the top).
There is actually a third area on Google?s pages that should show on any search engine marketing campaign?s radar ? the On...Read More.
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Thu, 1 Mar 2007 16:52:04 by Pete Handley
I've just been reading a thread on Googles Webmaster Central Blog, about how they are improving notifying site owners of "badware" that they think they have identified on a site.
Not only is there a section of the Google Webmaster Tools that will tell you what they perceive as "badware", they will also email you to notify you about this.
The difficulty with this system, is how do they iden...Read More.
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Thu, 1 Mar 2007 10:20:25 by Matt Hopkins
In February, Google added personalized search for every logged-in user, so now it's even more likely that your search results will be different than your friend's, your clients, or perhaps your marketing agency. The goal of personalised search is to once again improve relevance by taking into consideration the types of sites that the searcher visits and prefers when returning search en...Read More.
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Thu, 1 Mar 2007 10:00:16 by Matt Hopkins
Blogs are a great source of information on all sorts of topics ? and especially when it comes to tips, techniques and trends in the search engine marketing industry. My personal list of blogs that I monitor is in the hundreds, but I thought that I would highlight a handful of the ?must reads? to get you started:
Matt Cuttshttp://www.mattcutts.com/blog/type/googleseo/Matt Cutts is the pre...Read More.
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