1. Google seem to be putting more emphasis to links from the actual content body of the page than the header, side navigation or footer links.
2. Queries that need fresh results impact around 6-10% of the search results to a noticeable degree and the business websites that have news in their content will get benefit from this.
3. Google seems to be paying more attention to the page content than the backlinks. They also say they are de-emphasising the “exact anchor text” backlinks. This means you should look at altering your “exact anchor text” approach if you have not already done so.
4. Google will tend to rank official websites even higher on Google’s result page. And this change is intended to provide the users with more relevant and authoritative results.

It will take something pretty special to take even a tiny slice of Google’s market share.

• First of all, keep it simple, it is all about the user and remember that Google is attempting provide the highest quality, most relevant search results possible
• Content, try and focus on quality over quantity. It is not enough now to purely have optimised content based on keywords. Content must now be informative, to the point, be well structured and easy to read
• 1000’s of links, we believe, are a thing of the past. Try and focus on quality and relevant links.
• Make the most of social media although from an SEO standpoint it is difficult to quantify. Google +1 is bound to have a positive impact, so get it installed on your website
• Search engines need to know that you exist. Create well researched URL’s, page titles, and meta description with your keywords in mind
• Duplicate content is dead. Do not duplicate your content, even if you are listing on a directory try and create new content about your service or products. Do NOT just cut and paste from your home or product pages

All these things considered, improving your in Google is an ongoing process. A new website owner should have realistic expectation about how quickly they will rank. Even with all of the above mentioned adhered to, Google still places a high importance on the age of your URL, just like a fine wine.

So, the moral of the story is if you are considering building a website ensure that it has good quality content within it, ensure the spelling is correct & is easy to read. This should also include structured pages, like ‘contact us’ & if you are going to add affiliate marketing to your website don’t ‘over do it’.

Anyhow, last week I went to update one of our clients listings and we were shocked to see that the only way to verify this change was to send a postcard to the listed address of our client. I did some searching online and could find nothing on the issue, including  Google blog.

Subsequently, I have tried listing from five other PC’s, on a different network & even from an Internet cafe’  & still the problem remains, thanks goodness it was not our accounts that are the problem.

So it seems Google phone verification may be a thing of the past, and it disappearing is creating a huge problem for businesses like ours. Yes, if you had not guessed it, we have lost a little of our control. Now, just to do the smallest change, we have wait until Google sends a postcard to our client (up to 3 weeks), then hope that is actually gets there & then they relay the information to us.

Surely this is not a cost effective option for Google.

I invite anyone who has had any experience with this change, or has any opinion, to share their experience with us as information on this issue is extremely limited at this stage.

Just a litle follow up on this article. If you need confirmation of this issue please visit Google Places Help.

You can see by the Google search result that the Google Places has placed a makr on the map where the business is but it has not allocated a letter. I dare say that this would be different if the business owner had an address without a letter within it.

Google Chrome Beta also has the following cool features:

• You will be able to use Google Chrome features in incognito mode
• Initial integration Adobe Flash
• Themes for homepage, startup, heaps of content settings and language features
• HTML5 features including Geolocation APIs, App Cache, web sockets and file drag-and-drop capabilities

Can you believe Google Keyword Tool actually suggests that the search term web site SEO gets 590 hits in Australia per month? Yet another rounded number by Google, I only with they would not round up or down, it would be so much more believable do you think…

Offsite Competitive SEO Elements Tips:

• Inbound links galore
• Get as many local listing as possible
• Tap into viral marketing
• Be a blogger
• Don’t be a twit, use Twitter
• Be a winner a use Google Business Listsing to promote your business
• Use page titles to win sales, see example for Alford Point Florist

seo india

Being cheap can be a big selling point for Indian SEO companies. Some of our clients get at least 10 emails a week from SEO companies in India pedalling various marketing packages. One of the packages in particular 100 links per month, on high PR sites, for $445 – ongoing. Is this really so cheap?

For small businesses like most the answer to that question lies in this question; How much is your time worth? How long would it take you to sift through thousands of websites adding comments about how fantastic their blog article was. So on that note let us look at this simple equation:

100 link per month – takes 15 minutes to research link, then add it to blog site = 15 minutes
100 x 15 = 1500/60
= 25 hours

So, 25 hours a month it would take a website owner to do linkbulding at this level. If you earn 45$ per hour that is 25 hours x 45 = $1125 worth of your time per month.

Enough of the maths already, I am sure you get the point.

In conclusion, if you are time poor and run your own business there is a pretty good argument there to outsource your SEO and linkbuilding to India.

By the way, this is just another experiment to test the integrity of Google Keyword Tool, obviously the words I am keen to target are SEO INDIA. If you missed the earlier post about it, read it here. That being said the arguement is a fair one.

If you look at the example below you will see that I only typed in two letters and Google is already listing all things Bryon Bay (which is just down the road from our offices), including Byron Bay Accommodation, Byron Bay, Byron Bay employment, Byron Bay Blues Festival, Byron Bay weather and much more. Clever ain’t it. Has anyone got another example near where they live?