Horaciobra Hosting Blog

When building a web site you need to fist have solid search engine optimization structure. You also need to create a lot of unique content talking about your main keywords of focus.  This will help to increase website traffic.

Your structure should include keywords in your Title, Meta Tags and Page content. However don’t use your keywords too much because you will be docked by the search engines for keyword abuse. 

I also recommend creating a blog and getting the word out there about your blog. This will help you dramatically to increase backlinks to your site which ultimately improve your search rankings.

Next, you must focus hard on obtaining links to your web site. You can create pages on popular sites such as Squidoo, Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, MyBlogLog, Blogger, and others. Once you create content on these web sites make a link to your actual main website. This will tell the search engines that you are legitimate and that you offer quality services.

If you don’t have time to do these sort of these things on your own, hire an expert! There are many marketing providers such as SEO consultants and SEO experts. These are people who can help work on your web site and teach you what you need to know about search engine optimization. You will notice that the services they offer usually come in two different forms. Make sure to interview them with a fine-tooth comb and ask for their portfolio.  SEO Consultants are great to help with your online marketing when you are first building your website on the Internet. Either way, they are just giving you the knowledge that you need to set up your own website.

Most of the time, when you find SEO experts that are willing to offer you paid advice, and after talking to them you will notice that you should hire them to do everything. You give them the information about your site, and they set it up in a way that is very appealing to search engines. They should also develop a strong link building campaign for your web site.

If you give a man a fish, you will feed him for a day and f you teach a man to fish, you will feed him for a life time. Pretty much, that means the SEO consultants are teaching you how to do search engine optimization and helping you. So you get the best of both worlds.

Do you know how to do SEO for your videos? Do you have a video or two on your site but are unsure how to do search engine optimization for them?

You are not alone. For a long time it was difficult to say what would help a video rank well in search engines such as Google, but it has become a lot easier than it used to be.

Here are the top 10 SEO tips for videos:

1- If you plan to upload a video to both your site and video distribution sites like YouTube, be sure to post it to your site first. That way you can get links through the embed codes where possible.

2- Make sure that your site has more content than you give the video distribution sites. For example, your site could include a “part 2” to the video or a textual transcription that can’t be had anywhere else. This can entice people to link to your site rather than the video distribution site.

3- Use your targeted keywords in the video’s file name, title, and in the tags where it is appropriate.

4- Build links to the video both internally and externally. Video, like any other content on the Web, will be judged by the same link standards.

5- Create a video sitemap for any videos on your site to make it easier for search engines to find all the video content.

6- Optimize the URL of the page where the video is located by naming the page with the keywords. Only have one video per URL.

7- Tweeting, bookmarking, and mentioning the video on social media sites are great ways to gather links.

8- Cross link your video to other relevant videos that you have done. This will help all of your videos rank better and be more useful for your visitor, which always leads to more views.

9- Create useful content that your visitors will want to link to. This will help to build natural links and encourage comments which also influence search engine rankings.

10- Use a video distribution service such as TubeMogul or Traffic Geyser to spread the video quickly across the Internet. These services can save you a lot of time.

These tips are primarily SEO related. There are a lot of topics about video that need to be discussed to get the most out of a multimedia campaign, but we shall talk about them in another post. Watch for them to come in the future. In the meantime, start recording!

Bonus tip: YouTube will soon let you connect with your friends easier. They are going to suggest people you know by recommending those you have sent videos to via email. Also, if you have connected your Gmail account with your YouTube account, they will suggest people from your contacts that also have a YouTube account.

The idea is to promote subscriptions between friends. One of the key factors in making all of this work is to be sure that your account settings are correct. If you’re not sure, simply go to the privacy settings within your YouTube account. There is a box there that states, “Let others find my channel on YouTube if they have my email address.” Make sure that the box is checked so you can be found and maybe even increase your subscriptions.

Let’s face it; the average business owner has neither the time nor the inclination to learn the nuances of search engine optimization. When I was first introduced to the concept of search marketing, I spent endless hours researching forums and blog trying to separate the signal from the noise. There’s no shortage of information and advice for business owners out there in theinterwebz , but finding trustworthy and reliable sources is another monster entirely. I would estimate that I invested hundreds of hours researching reliable sources ofSEO and SEM information, and I am thrilled to this day when I discover new ones. This can be a daunting prospect for a small business owner, regardless of their current level of marketing knowledge. I know when I was trying to grow my first small business, I barely had time to eat and sleep…much less surf the web for hours on end.

The real key to local search visibility is to recognize that your location is your brand. In most cases, searches with local intent rarely reflect brand terms. In the research I have seen, most local searches are industry and/or service based with geographic qualifiers. For example, “boston emergency plumber” or “san diego pediatric dentist” are more likely to be searched for than “city name + your business name”. If people are searching for your business by name, that’s great! You’ve done a great job establishing your brand! But if your sole focus is on brand promotion, you are missing out on some great opportunities to develop relationships with new customers in your area. Recent research has shown that almost 40% of allinternet searches are local in intent. If you want to maintain a lead over your competition, now is the time to take action. The following short-list of actionable items will help get you started:

1. Get listed at all of the major local search engines and telecom directories. Start with Google Local and Yahoo Local. There are also services such as UniversalBusinessListing.org which facilitate your submissions to such sites for a minor fee. If you don’t have the time to manually submit your listings, this is an excellent option.

2. Get links from related local sites, industry associations, and the chamber of commerce. One thing to keep in mind is the importance of anchor text; the clickable words that link to your website. Ask your business partners to link to your website using the phrase you want to rank for as anchor text (ie. “boston emergency plumber”, if you are a plumber in Boston). You could even incentivize your suppliers to link to you in exchange for a discount, as the value of the links gained will far outweigh the short-term costs of discounting.

3. Get reviews from customers and/or suppliers. If you go to Google and do a search for “your industry +reviews”, you should come up with a decent list of sites that contain reviews of businesses like yours. Naturally, some industries are more popular than others. If you don’t find one related to your industry, consider it an opportunity and start your own review site To continue with the discount idea noted above, why not give your customers a discount for a favorable review? Note that businesses can be given reviews directly on Google Local, but you also want your reviews to appear on reputable third party sites like Yelp.com (for restaurants), TripAdvisor.com (for hotels, etc.) or RateItAll.com (for general consumer products).

4. Consider the impact of universal search. Universal search refers to the use of non-traditional media in standard search results. Search engines generally serve up hypertext search results. With the introduction of universal search, Google now serves up video, photos, news, etc. in addition to hypertext. Get your geeky nephew to help you produce a video for Youtube. Take some funny photos of the hijinks in your office and upload them to Flickr. Ask one of your industry bloggers if you can contribute an article to their site. Submit a press release. Write an article like this and syndicate it. The opportunities are endless, if you are motivated.

Jacob Davidson is happy to share his new found knowledge of search engine marketing with other small business owners. When he is not trying to stay abreast of the latest marketing and advertising techniques, he spends his time exploring the local yellow pages for new business leads.