I was looking at our search analytics yesterday and saw that a number of people found this blog, searching for the phrase marketing advice, using google.
I entered the phrase into google and saw that I was on page 1 of google.com. As I write this, I’m still on page 1, though this will change – possibly by the time you read this. See below:
Is google getting smarter?
Although I use meta tags for each post and title tags for some posts, the copy writing here is not deliberately optimised. In other words, I write exclusively for humans and not to keep search engines happy. Even so, google has been able to identify that there’s lots of marketing advice on this blog.
This confirms what many experts have told me; that the easiest way to optimise a site, is to stick to your topic and make it as valuable as you possibly can. After all, the content on your site is what encourages people to link to you. These links allow new people to discover your site – But they are also used by google as a way to ascertain the value of your content.
Any good search engine optimisation (SEO) expert will be able to help you get more targeted traffic to your site. In my opinion, every business these days should have a budget for professional SEO. However, it’s comforting to know that by focusing on good quality content, you can still achieve page 1 rankings for valuable search terms.
Related posts:
Hey, Jim. It’s good to point out that content should be created for the benefit of your visitors, and not primarily for search engines. That’s an essential element of increasing conversion rate as traffic increases. It doesn’t matter if a site ranks #1 for 100 different terms and gets 100,000 uniques a month if none of them convert, after all.
Google uses a seemingly endless number of variables when it comes to rank, but one of many high value ranking factors is incoming links – as I’m sure you already know.
Your home page alone has over 13,000 incoming links. If we were to dive into the anchor text of those links, I’d venture to say that many of them use the terms your site ranks well for…like “marketing advice”.
Your home page title also includes the term “marketing advice”. Often times when one site links to another, they will use the title as the anchor text of the link. Thus you’ve played a bigger part in the optimization of your site for that term than you may have realized. Well done!
Alysson,
Thanks for the comment. My point was that the actual copy writing here is not optimised for search engines – but for people. I mentioned in my post, that content is what drives the number of relevant links you get.
The blog itself was originally configured for me by a professional blog designer (Mark White) and he did a great job of making it ‘visible.’
@alysson
I think Jims point is that it was the fact he writes for people and not for google that got him those links.
Most wordpress Blogs come out of the box with pretty good seo.
I think that with very basic seo, a good quality writer can get excellent results before spending a dime on pro seo.
@Jim – you’re absolutely right…and your blog is proof that a solid SEO foundation coupled with great content is the key to ranking success. Without that solid foundation, though, your great content would be buried in the SERPs.
@sandy – I understood Jim’s point and I completely agree. I don’t agree, however, that WordPress comes “out of the box” with pretty good SEO. There are a number of issues with the standard WordPress installation that need to be addressed using a variety of plugins.
There’s a lot to “basic SEO” and a person must spend time and/or money learning it on their own or hiring someone to take care of it for them.
The vast majority of business owners aren’t as Marketing savvy as Jim. Basic Marketing principles go hand-in-hand with SEO, so his success with this blog isn’t as surprising, accidental or unintentional as one might think.
Good solid quality content updated frequently is assured to attract more traffic when coupled with good basic SEO utilities.
Hi Jim, thank you very much for your posting. Google uses a seemingly endless number of variables when it comes to rank, but one of many high value ranking factors is incoming links – as I’m sure you already know.
If you update your website with quality content regularly, you must obtain more traffic.
Alysson,
Thanks for the clarification!
Anthony,
That’s a pretty powerful mix.
Cecilia,
It’s rare you will find a poorly-written blog achieving good results in the medium or long-term – Exclusively through great SEO. As you say, you need both.
Hey Jim… I like how your title of the blog post is “marketing advice” which will now assist you in ranking even better for the term
On the topic of writing content for search engines, you may find this an interesting read… http://www.marketingfan.com/death-of-the-seo-copywriters-spam-detection-with-phrase-based-information-retrieval
Ross,
I thought google didn’t place much weight on titles any more?
Not at all. Using < strong> or commands to call attention to the terms within the page content is also an important on-site SEO factor, but not nearly as important as the title.
To clarify, the title I’m referring to is not necessarily the title of the page or post as it appears within the visible content, though it should be noted that your target terms should be within that “title”, as well.
However, the title I’m referring to is the , which appears within the source code and at the very top of the screen above the address bar in your browser.
I hope this helps to clarify things a bit.
@Jim – oh sweet Moses! Please don’t think that. Titles are a MAJOR ranking factor and one of the first things that must be taken into consideration as part of even the most basic on-site SEO strategy.
Alysson,
My understanding was that it was the title tag that had SEO weight – rather than the ‘actual’ title. Of course, on that post they were both ‘marketing advice’ so it wouldn’t matter.
Jim,
It IS the title tag (as it appears in the browser’s top bar) that counts and not the actual post title.
The posts title may have a small amount of sway, but it’s the title tag that’s most relevant.
+2 for title-tags Jim.
Alysson,
Looks like everyone was already saying the same thing about title tags – crossed wires uncrossed.
Jim,
Glad we’re all on the same page now. Mistaking the visible title on the page for the “page title” is a pretty common mistake, so I’m glad we got some clarification.
Just as a side note, not all comments sections allow for html. Yours does…so my last comment doesn’t read as it should. My bad!
Alysson,
I assumed you accidentally forgot to turn bold off. I noticed your comment looked ‘odd’ but unless asked to, I leave them how they arrive.
@Alysson,
We all make mistakes. According to my wife, its usually me
Gary,
How’s your new blog coming on? Let me know when it’s done so I can take a look.
@Gary – HAHA! Right on…we do all make mistakes. And it appears you’ve found the key to a happy marriage…leading your wife to believe that you accept that it’s “usually” you, whether you actually believe it or not.
I find that SEO is such a tricky area and there are so many ’specialists’ offering to optimise peoples’ sites or ‘get them to the top of Google.’ To me, it is all about laying the foundations first with an easy to use, representative site so that any traffic is not only relevant to what you offer, but actually starts a dialogue with them.