SEO For The Common Webmaster

Google’s own Matt Cutts excited the online world yesterday by adding a bit of link bait to his blog. He announced that the Google Pagerank (PR) will be coming over the next few days. I have seen this linked all over the Internet and there is a buzz. Here is the post address if you care to see for yourself http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/google-pagerank-update/.

As I have written on this blog before, it is a good way to see how you are doing in creating back links but it is not good for a true measure of how your site is doing. It brings no traffic and it can easily be manipulated.

I do have to hand it to Matt though, link baiting is one of the best ways to build back links and his short little post has stirred up the webmaster world and his link is all over the place. Take an example from him and find hot topics that will create a stir and you too could see the benefit of such posts.

Google offers some of the best webmaster tools in the business. Without a doubt, they are the leader when it comes to Internet search and webmaster related stuff. However, wake up webmasters, Google is not a God.

I am a member at many webmaster forums and I am always seeing threads started asking of this or that is allowed by Google. Some stuff is related directly to Google’s services like Adsense and Adwords. However, many times webmasters are asking what they can or can not do on their own site. You, the webmaster, own the site! Google may lower your search rankings but with the right marketing and advertising, that will not mean the end of your website.

Look at John Chow’s blog. He does not even rank for the words “John Chow.” His blog is still one of the most profitable on the Internet. I am not saying you should not try to rank high on Google. I am not saying you should say, “FU Google.” What I am trying to say is that your site should be built for you and your readers, not for Google. You should not spend your whole time worrying rather anything you say or do is going to have you removed from Google.

Truth be told, they need us as much as we need them. Their rules are generally fair and try to prevent spam sites from reaching the top. If you are an ethical webmaster, there should never be a problem. If you are trying dishonest tricks to beat out the competition, you may get caught.

Be the best webmaster you can and do all the honest link building and advertising you can and your website will be successful. Above all, remember, Google is not a God!

Often times as a webmaster, we do not want to do all the work of starting a site from scratch. To avoid this, we may purchase a website or blog that is already up and running. However, when doing so, one needs to do lots of research to make sure that they know all the details before buying a site.

If the site claims to have loads of traffic, find out where that traffic is coming from. Traffic by the thousands can be generated by using services like Stumble Upon. Though the number of visits increase, the traffic is useless. Ask the seller to provide proof by showing the stats from the website. Most websites have some kind of tracking that shows where the traffic is coming from. If it is mostly from social bookmarking sites, the traffic is useless and lowers the value of the site. Also beware of false traffic from weird sites. Check those out to see what they are.

Another consideration is what is the site earning and from where. If they claim to be making $400 a month from Google Adsense, make sure you see proof. Also find out what they are doing to get that amount of earnings. If they are spending $300 a month on things like Adwords, than the earnings is really $100 a month. This is still decent earnings but it changes the value of the site.

Looking at the domain name is important. Is it something that is easy to market, when does it expire, and how easy it to transfer? You need to know if it has any fees to transfer. Also make sure how the files of the site will be delivered. Ask if the seller will transfer to your host or are you required to do so. Make sure you know how to transfer the whole site prior to buying.

If you are looking for original content that is not just copied from elsewhere, make sure to both ask and check for yourself. It is easy to copy the first paragraph into Google or use Copyscape.com  to check to see if the  content is located elsewhere. Be sure to check several articles to make sure that the original was not just copied from the site you are wanting to buy. To me, a website or blog with original unique articles is worth a lot more than a site loaded with content that belongs to someone else. Be sure to give the owner the chance to explain and not jump to conclusions. However, if they lie about it than it is better not to deal with them.

If Page Rank or Google PR is important to you, make sure the PR stated is not faked. There are many PR checkers that can check for fake PR. You can also check Google by searching for the site URL. If it shows up with a different URL, it most likely is faked.

One last piece of advice is to check the WhoIs information for the domain. this can be check at http://whois.sc. They will tell all information related to age, domain registrar, and owners information along with details about the site.

I would like to think that the majority of webmasters are just honest people who are trying to make an honest living. However, there is always scammers trying to steal your money.  Make sure if you are thinking of buying a website or blog, you follow the above advice and do all the research you can so you avoid being scammed.

It is pretty certain that the next Page Rank update is going on. Many PR tools are buzzing with new numbers to excite the masses of webmaster. All the webmaster forums are pumping threads and threads about the current PR update.

I do not claim to have inside knowledge but I do believe Google has changed a few things in their algorithm again. I do not rely heavily on the PR number but it is a good measure of how well a webmaster has done when it comes to link building. I spent a good bit of energy and money to build links for this site. As of now, we have went from PR0 to PR2. This is much lower than I expected for all the back links that I have acquired. I have other blogs which are higher with a lot less links. I also think my links to this site were higher quality than the ones for the other blogs. This proves one thing, you can not figure out Google because their algorithm remains a secret.

Overall, some of my blogs were up and down. Some regained the lost PR from the last update and some remain the same and one loss ranking. This means nothing in the matter of traffic, my traffic has slowly increased over the last two months and I look forward to a bigger jump in the months.

How did your sites do? How important do you think PR is in the whole scheme of things? Please share you thoughts by leaving a comment.  

I have run across many webmasters who use the excuse that they do not have the time to do Search Engine Optimization for their websites. They create tons of great content and they set up a beautiful website with all the frills and wonder why they get no traffic. I want to shake them and tell them that SEO is not an option, it is a requirement.

Creating a great site is nothing if you do not do everything you can to help people find your website. This is done through quality SEO. I understand that people are crunched for time and they often do not have the time for everything. My answer is this, if you do not have time to prepare your taxes, do you just not do them? No, you hire a professional accountant or tax preparer. If you do not have time to fix your car, do you quit driving? No, you hire a mechanic to fix it. These are all things that are important and required in life.

Guess what? SEO is just as important if you plan to be successful as a webmaster. If you do not know how to optimize your site or you just do not have the time, it is time to get help. A SEO Company can do all the work for you. From optimizing your keywords to building back links, a quality company can make your site search engine friendly and easy to find.

No more excuses, as a webmaster you have two choices when it comes to SEO. Either make the time or do as many other webmasters do and hire a professional SEO Company to do the work for you. Either way, you can no longer afford to ignore the importance of SEO.