LotusJump Blog

Search Engine Optimization is a significant way to measure and improve a webpage’s performance. By now, you are probably familiar with basic SEO techniques such as posting quality content, writing full-length articles, adding meta tags, title tags, etc. In reality, there are many different techniques that help users position their web pages ahead of other websites in search engines. During the initial stages of posting articles, quality and relevant content can draw traffic to one’s website; however, using advanced SEO techniques can help users drive traffic consistently for a long-lasting campaign. This article enumerates some of the advanced SEO tricks that would help bloggers to showcase their web pages to a broad spectrum of internet users.

Utilize Internal Linking

Providing internal links is one the easiest ways to rank higher in the search engines. In fact, internal
links help to popularize the other pages in your website which might have poor visibility through search
engines directly. Linking internally will also help you to list several links from your website in the search
pages, thereby increasing the chances for viewers to visit your contents. In addition, the use of anchor
tags in internal links boosts the search engine rankings as well.

Optimize Your Images

As images visually represent the content of a blog post, they too need proper keywords and tags. In fact,
about one-fifth of the daily users search for images related to their needs. You might have noticed the
name of certain images represented as image 1, image 2, DSC002, etc., which are the default names
assigned by the tools used to photograph them. Such default text should be renamed with words
relevant to your content. Only then, these images will be listed in the top pages of the search engines
when users search with keywords related to the content in your webpage.

Another common mistake that most bloggers commit is the use of blank spaces while naming their
images. A blank space in an image will be displayed as “%20″ which looks awkward, especially in the
address bar. Instead, use special characters like hyphens or plus signs for keyword spacing. If you are using
blogger to post your content, add ‘alt’ and ‘title’ attributes to the image tag through its HTML source
code.

Translate Feature

If you think that majority of the internet users make their searches in the international language, then
you are wrong. In fact, certain sources predict that more than 60 percent of the total users perform
their searches using languages other than English. Translating your content to other languages will open
up your web pages to a broad spectrum of visitors, not to mention there is less competition in foreign
search engines when compared to the conventional ones, thereby making it easier for your webpage to
climb higher in the search list.

Optimize keyword phrases

If you are familiar with the basics of SEO techniques, you should know the significance of keywords and where to include them on your site and in content. However, keyword phrases are mutually important as well.

The use of generalized keywords would drive a lot of traffic; but, as several blogs and web pages use
similar keywords, chances for your page to rise amidst the others are less likely. That’s when keyword
phrases help users to boost their content’s visibility and proceed forward in the ranking system as well.
Most content creators target users who make their searches with one or two words. But, you would be
much more successful if you target users who type 3 to 4 words to make their searches that are very
specific to their needs.

Utilize Free Resources

There are several analyzing programs available over the internet. In fact, some of the best tools are
available for free. To mention a few, Google Analytics & GoogSpy are some of the dedicated online services that collects information
about the popular keywords which are used in a popular search engine. Typing the words related
to a website would bring a list of keywords that the particular website bids on. In fact, users can get
information about the best keywords and keyword phrases that have high conversion rates. There are
several other free applications that would help you learn the practical keywords in use.

Examine Log Files

A casual glance at your server’s log files could provide you useful information about the keywords that are being used to find your website through search engines. If you find unfamiliar keywords in these files, optimizing them in your website will boost traffic further. This process should be done periodically to increase traffic consistently.

The above tips have the potential to help you boost your webpage’s ranking and traffic in search engines. However, don’t expect changes to happen overnight. Keep an eye out for potential areas to optimize your website and improve accordingly. After all, learning and implementing SEO techniques requires time and dedication for successful results.

About the author: Alia Haley is a blogger by profession. She loves writing on technology, health and parenting. Beside this she is fond of games and gadgets. These days she is busy in writing articles on nokia lumia 800 specifications and Andrew Lauren.

First of all, happy ‘leap’ day to everyone out there, especially those with birthdays today. To make this day even more special, we are going to start offering a free months credit for every person that you refer to LotusJump SEO software. All you have to do is send us an email at support@lotusjump.com (including the name and email address used by your referral to sign up for an account) and we will credit* that amount to your account. If you do not already have an account with us, sign up for a free trial and we will extend it an extra 30 days. Happy link-building!

Sincerely,

Your friends from LotusJump

*Referral bonus only applies to subscribers who continue past any trial phase offered

Millions of businesses throughout the world rely heavily on traffic generated through the major search engines (Google, Yahoo!,  Bing) to generate traffic and sales, which is why the latest Google Panda(monium) update has led to chaos around the web. The update, designed to improve the overall search quality for users, was said to have affected over 12% of website rankings. This figure could be on the rise as newer (but smaller) updates seem to be released monthly.

• Original Content - High-quality, unique content has been (and always will be) the way to go when publishing content on a website. One of the biggest reasons sites were penalized was due to a lack of original, unique content. Spend the necessary time to ensure you don’t violate this website “code of conduct” and strive to have at least 500 words of content on your homepage, as well as the rest of your product/service sub-pages. If you are using content that is found on a different site, be sure to link to it and give credit to the source.
• Relevance - This one may sound like a “no-brainer” but you’d be surprised at how many sites there are that don’t match up the title tags/header tags with the content on the page. For example, if your site has a product page about dog food, make sure that the title tags, meta description, and headline tags contain the words “dog food” (hopefully a little more descriptive than that) in them.
• Backlink Profile -Search engines still rely heavily on a website’s link profile to determine how well the keywords rank. Strive to build a diverse backlink profile - don’t try and build all of your links from the same type of source. If you need help finding relevant places to build links, there are a few quality SEO softwares out there that can help. Also strive to integrate social media (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn) into your business since any mentions of your brand via these mediums can lead to positive outcomes.
• Keyword Density/Variation - Don’t try and abuse or manipulate the system by spamming your keywords throughout your site’s content - search engines grow smarter by the minute and can almost always detect this. Instead, shoot to use your keyword (in different variations) about 2% of the total content. So if you are targeting a search term such as “weight loss pill”, use phrases such as “pill that can assist in weight loss” or “losing weight is a problem we all face. Fortunately, there are pills…”.
• Professionalism - Or in other words, make sure that the written content is grammatically correct without any misspellings, sentence fragments, or run-on sentences. To ensure that your site maintains a high level of professionalism, consider having 2-3 people read over each page of content to check for any of these errors. Yes, search engines can detect grammatical errors and may have an adverse effect on your keyword rankings.
• User-friendliness - Is your site easy to read and navigate, and does it offer insightful information (or helpful links)? High bounce rates are suspected to have a negative effect on rankings, so be sure to provide engaging content that will keep the user on the page for as long as possible with a desire to visit other pages of your site. Broken links are never a good thing. Be sure to update or 301 redirect them to their respective pages.

Keep in mind that having just 1 bad or irrelevant page of content can negatively impact the other pages of your site. Don’t get careless! Take some time to give your website a thorough review or get help from a professional SEO company and make sure you are keeping up to date with the latest SEO practices.

Because of the grinding nature of linkbuilding, there are several tools (like LotusJump) that exist to automate aspects of the linkbuilding process. However, it’s widely acknowledged that automation can only take you so far before you’re required to get involved. However, what if that’s not the case? While it may be a slight case of apples to oranges, let’s take a look at how search engines do it.

Take Google for example. A user comes to Google with a human request, such as a question. Google takes that information and runs it through an algorithm that pulls data from an index that was created by another extremely complex algorithm. It then returns what the algorithm tells it was the best response to the input.

Now imagine taking that approach with linkbuilding. You give the engine some human information – the URL you’re building links to, and perhaps some keyword data. The engine goes out and looks at its index of sites, paying attention to both on-page and off-page indicators in order to determine each site’s value, personality, and niche. Then it returns a list of best matches, along with an algorithmically determined link request email for each result, complete with an algorithmically determined email scraped off the site, and some site-specific language. Then, all the user needs to do is accept the result and the software automatically sends. Far-fetched? Perhaps. But then again, an examination of how search technology has advanced is instructive and encouraging.

One gripe that will doubtless be made is that this is an imperfect system. The algorithm won’t always get it right. I contend, however, that while this may be the case, it’s much like a search engine. You don’t get the result you want every time you do a search, but it works often enough to make it worth it.

How big a role do you think automation will play in the future of SEO?

Been thinking about launching an email marketing campaign?  Check out Contactology, our LotusJump spotlight of the week, for your email marketing needs.

We asked Contactology what the inspiration was behind their company, this is what they had to say:

Contactology was founded in 2002 as a web development company.  Around this time email marketing was emerging as an effective marketing channel, and our clients requested a powerful tool to assist in driving revenue growth through email.  We responded by developing an Email Manager, which would later be branded as Contactology.

The email marketing and online survey component of our business grew quickly, and within four years, the business model shifted from service-based company to a software as a service model.

At Contactology, the core of who we are is in the service we provide.  Our application provides sophisticated functionality at a reasonable price.  Our people deliver by providing strategic and tactical advise to maximize the value of email marketing.  Contactology is more than a powerful product – we are a team dedicated to helping our clients achieve a high return on investment.

When asked what achievement they were most proud of, Contactology said:

Our organic growth is a source of pride for our entire staff.  We bootstrapped our business and have achieved 100% revenue growth in 2007 and 2008.  Our revenue growth continues to accelerate in 2009 despite the recession.  We believe this is in part to our philosophy of offering enterprise level features at reasonable prices.

In addition to our growth model, our aggressive product improvements continue to delight our customers.  Our philosophy of listening and responding to the needs of our clients is responsible for the development of our online survey module, and our EasyCast add-on which allows customers to send email marketing from Outlook or any other email client while still harnessing the powers of our mail servers and tracking. Our development efforts always are a direct response from the needs of our clients.

Continuously building new solutions within our product that meet our customers’ needs is a source of great pride and inspiration for the Contactology team.

We asked Contactology why Internet marketing is so important for their company, this is what they had to say:

As a software as a service company in the technology industry, Internet marketing  has allowed us to effectively target and acquire customers in need of email marketing services.  It has consistently provided us with the highest return on investment for customer acquisition.

We gave Contactology a chance to give a “Creative Marketing Tip of the Day”, this is what they said:

We would recommend creative use of triggered emails. This allows you to send personalized, relevant content to customers and potential customers based on events specific to them. For instance, you can have emails automatically sent on a client’s birthday. This helps cement the relationship – a cornerstone of small business best practices

Thanks Contactology for letting us get to know you a little more!  Leave a comment if you think you’re worthy of a Friday spotlight, and tell us why!

We’re excited to spotlight our LotusJumper of the week MODassic Marketing, a Texas internet marketing firm, who has been using LotusJump in-house to help with their own internet marketing efforts.

We asked MODassic Marketing what the inspiration was behind their company, this is what they had to say:

MODassic Marketing is all based on the idea of “balance”.  Our name comes from combining the words modern and classic, an approach we take in both design and the marketing strategies we utilize.  We combine proven traditional marketing theories with new technologies. Additionally we provide small businesses with a balanced approach to marketing.

When asked what achievement they were most proud of, MODassic Marketing said:

We recently produced an online video and viral marketing campaign for a client at  www.Texaplex.com The video uses viral marketing as a way to solve the current economic crisis. We all hear and talk about the “bad” news and that just makes it worse because we become hesitant and don’t spend. However this project gets the good news out there and despite what people hear and think there is a lot of good news, especially here in Texas. The response has been overwhelming.

We asked MODassic Marketing why Internet marketing is so important for their company, this is what they had to say:

The internet lets you segment and narrow in on the most specific of demographics and reach your perfect target audience. Because of this, small businesses are now able to compete on the a level that was once reserved only for large corporations who could afford massive media buys.

We gave MODassic Marketing a chance to give a “Creative Marketing Tip of the Day”, this is what they said:

“Perfection in design is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but rather when you have nothing more to take away” - Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Thanks MODassic Marketing for letting us get to know you a little more!  Leave a comment if you think you’re worthy of a Friday spotlight, and tell us why!

We’re excited to announce that LotusJump has launched new features and pricing options to make your LotusJump experience even more awesome.

The new pricing structure is setup to fit any size business or budget - the Basic package costs $24/month, and the Pro package starts at $49/month.

So, the question remains… Pro or Basic?

Basic - $24/month

• 1 website
• 1-3 keywords

Pro - $49/month

• 1 website
• up to 10 keywords
• competitive backlink feature gives you an edge on your competition
• option to add-on multiple domains ($19/month)
• option to add-on additional keywords ($10 for 5 additional keywords)

A special thanks to Mozy online backup for today’s Tuesday Tip of the Week.

Back in November of 2008 we launched our “Computer Nightmare Video Contest”. To enter the contest people had to send us their video depicting their worst computer nightmare - cool prizes aside, we got some pretty awesome videos.

Whether you create your own viral video, or create a viral video campaign – videos are a simple and cost efficient way to add personality to your brand. If you have a good idea you don’t have to spend a lot of money on production to create a catchy video, all you need is a good idea and a vision. Put your video on YouTube, send it out to your clients, ask them to send it to their friends – before you know it, your video has gone viral.

Thanks Mozy for the great idea! To see the winners (and some pretty clever videos!) visit http://mozy.com/computernightmare or check them out at the Mozy YouTube channel!

Leave a comment with your tip and we’ll consider publishing it with a link to your website in future Tuesday Tip editions!

A little humor for Friday. You decide: