This is a guest post by Jeff from ArverneByTheSea.com.
Search engines are constantly evolving and updating the ways they rank webpages according to variables like links, backlinks, keywords and phrases, on-page and off-page content, how long a site has been around, how often it is updated, physical location and much more.
The goal of search engines is not to help you, the webpage or blog owner, get ranked higher.
Their goal is to provide searchers with the most relevant information possible, first, given the keywords or phrases entered into a search. With that in mind, here are some ways to improve your search rankings:
- Provide Unique, Quality Content
Copying content is the cardinal sin of optimization, and sites have been blacklisted for this practice. The second worst transgression is irrelevant content. Yes, a lot of people search for “porn” for instance, but if you sell shoe laces linking to or from this ever-popular term will hurt, not help your searchability. The trick is to as much as possible, treat your search engines like people. People don’t like being fooled or lied to and neither do these search engines. - Guest Post
Again providing relevant and unique content, find blogs in your niche and provide content for them with a link at the end of the content. There are sites that invite this openly to bloggers in a niche, so check those out, and create relationships with bloggers so you can exchange guest posts. - Quality Before Quantity
Having a lot of content still helps, but more so over time. In fact a hundred new links overnight will “scare” search engines initially, and they will look for plagiarized and spun content within. One good link with great original content on a site with authority is worth hundreds of poorly written irrelevant links. Instead get one great piece of content and share it with others. - Avoid Automated Services
There has yet to be built a computer that can even come close to mimicking a human being writing stuff. This doesn’t stop many from trying though, and they will even charge you for this horrible service. Automated content offers the reader nothing of value, hurts your brand image if it is stumbled upon by a real human, and search engines hate it. - Get To Know Other Bloggers
There are hundreds of millions of blogs, and chances are many of these are in your niche. Say hi, ask to guest post and allow them to do the same. These symbiotic relationships are a great boost to your searchability if the content is of high quality and unique and if each site has some authority. Comment as well as guest post if you see an article you like, always saying something useful. - Social Networks
The major ones right now are Facebook and Twitter, and if you are a B2B industry LinkedIn is also a quality source. Create your page and offer good content and updates, just as you would a blog. Invite others and visit others in your niche, “liking” their content when applicable, and asking them to do the same for you. In addition, when you friend someone on a social network and they choose to “follow” you they can automatically be notified of updates to your blog, increasing the likelihood of more visits, and visits from those who actually want to read your content.
Building online presence takes time and effort, but it is very rewarding as well, when done the right way. There really is no shortcut to long-term success however, so avoid bots, irrelevant posts, automated systems and other black hat tactics and stick to the suggestions provided above.
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Very good post Jeff. Agree with you big time about not writing too much content too fast. Slow and steady wins the race. Also agree big time about getting to know other bloggers. If you can befriend bloggers and show that you actually want to get to know them on a personal level it’s so much easier to do guest posts and form collaborations.
Jeff,
great post! In the Wake of the Google Panda updates, what you say here has proven to be absolutely true. Quality matters!!! duplicate content and spun content for backlinks are only going to hurt your blog in a long term.
like you said networking and really having top-notch quality will win out in the long run for sure. The Google algorithm is only going to get smarter and base its rankings more on “user” preferences. Thin sites may still sometimes rank but I guarantee this will become less and less frequent as time marches on.
I would say quality content on your own site has got to be just as important as anything else now. With the introduction of social signals (Google+) the only real way to succeed long term is by giving searchers exactly what they want.
Gaming the system with links can only last so long in my eyes.
I love the way you have described all the points and I love the point “quality before quantity” the most. quality matters a lot after the release of Google Panda.
I am just curious about unique content that a website must have. It is mean copying 100% the same content from another site or what? Can I spin the article and make it around 10unique, can I claimed that was my original content in the eyes of Google?
And I notify one thing..Blogspot able to rank at the 1st page 2nd position of Google and Google Site definitely can rank at the 1st position..I don’t know why, you have any idea how to rank these free site in short time?
Strangely enough, it took me a while to realize that unique content and relevant content are not the same thing. For some reason it just seems that everywhere when people talk about unique content, they instantly assume that it is high quality relevant content that the readers will be interested in. It’s almost as if these people are telling readers what they want to read rather than giving them what they would want.
I think the changes in algorithm affected almost all sites. After the Panda effect, sites that are not being monitored all went down with their PR. I think these tactics are great to help save the time of researchers in browsing irrelevant search results.
Thanks for the tips Jeff. It is right that websites and bloggers needs to focus on quality and replication. Finally, as users we will feel that the results we get are better.
What’s most important to understand about SEO is that it takes time to do well. You aren’t going to see results immediately, and sometimes it can take months to notice any kind of change. The key is to stick with it and not give in to spammy black hat tactics that will ultimately come back to haunt you.
Nice reading Jeff!
The post-Panda online world needs quality content, that’s for sure. And I agree that guest posting is one of the best way to show the best information we have to targeted audiences. If done well, it can bring in much traffic and powerful backlinks.