Blackhat seo in a box

[SpyBoy]

SEO in a Box – Updated

Many claim SEO is complicated. I claim it’s not.

In fact, to me it is easier than it was ten years ago. Why? Back then you had to optimize for 8 different search engines. Today, you just have to optimize for one: Google. While there is more competition today than there was ten years ago, most marketers are lazy and you can use that to your advantage by following my methodology.

How is SEO easy? Let me show you.

First, say you perform SEO for sites that you own, or for merchants as affiliates, or you do SEO work for clients. Then chances are, you have asked the question: “We’re currently on page 4 in Google for term “XYZ”. We want to get on the first page. How can we do it quickly and effectively?”

I’m not going to lecture you, speaking in “code” or “theory”. Instead, let’s roll up our sleeves and actually do it. I’ll even use a real example, and I’ll pull from my own site. I’ll use the keyword term “meta expires”.

When this article was first written, the phrase ranked #8 in Google and a month later it ranked #4 with an indented listing and now it is #1 with a double-listing.

How did I do it? It was easy, and I am going to show you how.

When I started this process the keyword phrase brought semi-decent traffic. My thought process back then was if I got into the “top three” it should at least triple the incoming unique visitors to the page.

Well, I missed the mark initially, getting only to #4, but with persistence, #1 was obtained. And getting there was based on limited work I did to the page. Let’s run through the process again so you can really see how easy SEO is.

Here is the screen-shot of the ranking in Google when I started the process:

meta-expires

Here is the current screen shot with the double indented listing:

meta-expires_001

Here is the step-by-step guide on how to properly optimize a page:

Step One: Verify that the keyword phrase converts visitors into buyers and supplies you a good profit. If this is a new concept for you, it is crucial you embrace it. You see, success online isn’t measured in traffic, it is measured in conversions. Therefore, you want to SEO the terms which bring you the most money in order to really grow your business.

Another point to consider is does the traffic convert with YOUR OFFER? Don’t make the mistake of relying on a survey or data which suggests that a certain keyword phrase has a “96% positive commercial intent.” You must test search traffic against your offer to see if the traffic converts. How do you do this? Pay Per Click (PPC).

“Wait,” you ask, “I’m going to use PPC…to test my SEO?”

Exactly. And it will save you so much frustration. Think about it. Do you have keyword phrases right now that bring you good, solid traffic but little to no conversions no matter what changes you make to the landing page? Often, the problem isn’t your offer, the problem is the traffic isn’t “convertible” traffic. That is why you use PPC.

Setup a campaign in AdWords with 50 or fewer keyword phrases, set the tracking code and start driving the traffic. Within a few hours or days, you will have results which can determine what keyword phrases are worth optimizing for.

Note: The example phrase I am using here isn’t a “converting” phrase due to obvious competitive reasons.

How do you measure if the keyword is good or not?

One of the best indicators, in terms of popularity, isn’t the cost per click in PPC, it is the number of advertisers. The more advertisers in PPC for the keyword phrase the more likely there is profit being made by someone. Think about it, if there are 30 advertisers for a keyword phrase, do you think someone is making money? Yeah. So that would be a great phrase to test.

Step Two: Check the cache of the page in Google. We want to make sure the page is at least “15 days freshly indexed” by Googlebot.

meta-tags-cache

The page is fresh, and has a strong history of consistent indexing. Why do we want it fresh? Well, if the page isn’t getting indexed on a regular basis by Google that means Google isn’t finding the page on its own, which signals the link campaign is stale and not doing its job. The bottom line: Your marketing needs a caffeine injection.

If your page isn’t fresh, there’s no need to panic. Just follow these three steps for your instant “caffeine injection”. Getting a fresh cache date just means you need Google to reindex the page. Here is my three-pronged approach to do just that:

1. Re-read the content. Does it need updating? How is the Title? The Description? Make the appropriate changes to improve the marketability of the page.
2. Go out and get 5-10 good links to the page. What is a good link? One where your page isn’t buried between links to Viagra and Free Casino Chips links. Oh, and don’t forget to make sure the pages that are linking to you also have fresh cache dates or they just may be worthless.
3. Write a blog post and reference your page. Blogging is a great way to get Google to reindex content. Use it to your advantage. This is also assuming that your blog is getting indexes consistently.

Lesson Learned: Good SEO isn’t just about good and original content, it is about MARKETING your content. Most SEOs fail to do this and is a big reason why their campaigns often fail to meet expectations.

What is the difference? Simply put, most SEOs write “good, original content” and then sit on their hands and wait for magic fairies to promote or link to the page. Good SEOs actual market their content by going after links, posting in forums, commenting on blogs, guest blogging, etc. Market your content – always.

Step Three: Verify Projected Traffic Levels for the Keyword. This can get a little tricky because if I go into WordTracker, it tells me there are no searches for the keyword phrase:

meta-expires-wordtracker

If I check through Google’s Keyword Tool and set the query to “Exact Match” Google comes back with 590 search queries over the last 30 days. I pulled my stats over the last 30 days back in February of ‘08 and this is what I got:

meta-expires-traffic

Ranking#8 in Google was pulling 108 uniques per month to my site. How about now with a #1 double listing? Remember we were shooting to triple the traffic … well, it was better than that.

Not only is it impressive that we had a six-fold increase in the traffic levels, but the keyword phrase went from #67 to #14 in terms of driving the most traffic to my site. And I am seeing overall improvement in an increase in the number of pages viewed per visitor, time on site and a decrease in bounce rate.

Let’s go back to the keyword data. The estimates that you get from keyword research tools should be understood that they are just that – estimates. Keyword research tools don’t have perfect data. Since Google has really beefed up their keyword tool, I have found their data to be more precise and accurate than any other third-party tool on the market. Plus, the tool is free which is a huge plus. I highly recommend you use it.

Step Four: Look at the Search Results in Google. Do the results show Premium Ads at the top? Do local results show? Universal Search (Shopping, News, Video, etc.)? Anything which can affect your SEO efforts? Oh, and don’t forget to look at who is in the Top Three. If there are sites like WikiPedia, Amazon, eBay, etc. you need to stop your analysis and move to the next keyword phrase. While those companies can be moved, it is difficult and time consuming. You’d be better off focusing on easier keywords first and then come back to this one later.

Step Five: Verify there is room for you in the market. I suggest using my Keyword Competition Tool and inputting the keyword and your target page for analysis. Why not use this tool and just take the number of pages listed in Google to find your competition? Because that isn’t your competition.

Let me give you a quick example of what I mean. Let’s take the term “impact words.” Typing the term into Google we see that there are over 85 million “competing” pages.

impact-words

The problem is, Google is telling you how many pages in its index contain both “impact” and “words” on the pages, but not necessarily together. So a page that read, “The impact of the truck was so intense, there were not words to describe it” would be counted as a competing page.

As you will clearly agree, a page with that content would NOT be a competitor for the term “impact words.” Sure you could search with quotes (i.e. “impact words”) to constrain the search, but that still is not going to tell you what you need to know.

So, what is your actual competition? It’s the pages listed on Page One of the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages). Period. It doesn’t matter how many pages there are, all that matters is if the pages in the Top Ten have been SEO’d.

That’s it. Period. Make sense? It should. By doing an SEO analysis of the Top Ten, we can determine how easy it is going to be for us to get a Top Ten ranking, or if it is going to be impossible.

Here is a portion of the output:

meta-expires-kwc1

These three indicators, Anchor, Title and Text, which refer to Advanced Searches in Google (allinanchor, allintitle and allintext) are the key for us to determine very quickly if the keyword has been SEO’d or not. While these indicators aren’t perfect, they do the job quickly.

Here are the basic definitions of the three columns:

Anchor: Which pages have the best link campaign for the keyword phrase (Off-Page SEO)?
Title: Which pages are the best in terms of the Title Tag and PageRank?
Text: Which pages have the best On-Page SEO for the phrase?

Look at the above graphic. As you compare the columns, you should notice that the Anchor and Text columns are mostly filled in, compared to the sparsely populated Title and URL columns. This suggests incoming anchor text and On-Page factoring are most important in terms of ranking for this particular keyword phrase.

Major Tip: Every keyword phrase is different in terms of what it needs to rank well. It isn’t always all about the links.

Tip: No matter what tool you use, before you commit to a few hours of marketing, take a few minutes to verify the data to ensure it is accurate.

Step Six: Verify On-Page SEO. I highly recommend using IBP (Internet Business Promoter). It is my personal SEO program of choice. Is their info perfect? No. But they have the best information out there in terms of an SEO package and it is easy to understand and execute.

Granted we are running this check on a general page about meta tags, not one that is specific about just the Meta Expires page. The result from IBP? A pathetic 69% (100% being perfectly optimized).

Okay, so the optimization sucks for that term, which is expected since it is a generic page. Now, if I rank #8 for the term on a general page, it would make sense that I could nail a double-listing for this term. A double-listing (indented listing) is highly coveted because the click through rate skyrockets with a double-listing. So, let’s do it.

Step Seven: We create a focused page (original content) on the definition and proper use of the Meta Expires tag that links to the general page. We make sure we create a compelling Title, a focused Meta Description, use the Keyword Phrase in a Heading and throughout the page. We then upload it to the server.

Step Eight: We need to get the newly page indexed. I wrote a blog post on a blog outside of this domain and used the keyword phrase in the Title of the post. I like to use the keyword phrase in the beginning of the Title as it gives me more “push” and my testing has shown it helps increase the rankings. If you have Google in your ping list, GoogleBot should come and index this post in about three hours, which will get the ball rolling in our favor.

Step Nine: Let’s rerun IBP on the new page and see how it fared:

kay, it is a lot better and it scores an 89%. IBP will show you a lot that is “wrong” (in RED) with your page. I advise you just skim through these items to ensure there aren’t any BIG issues. Mostly, the RED issues IBP found are there aren’t any links detected, which makes sense because it is a new page.

My advice is if you get a rating of 80% or better, move on. The page is good enough. You can spend an hour on a page and only get a 2-3% increase. There are better uses for your time.

Update: When I reran IBP the page scored an 82%. Why the drop when nothing had changed on the page? IBP scores sites based on findings from the Top Ten results for that phrase. Also, Google had a few algorithm changes too, so that probably factored into the decline. I fixed a few issues, which was mainly On-Page Content related and the score went up to 88%.

Step Ten: Run Backlink Analyzer and the Link Finder to find places to get links that the competition has already found. You can also use Linkscape from SEOMoz to do link analysis too.

From my analysis when I first took on this project, there wasn’t any page really focused on the keyword term. What does that mean? If we pick up about a dozen links or so, we should be able to capture a top three spot inside of 30 days.

30 Day Update: Traffic levels with the increased ranking and the double listing are 156, which is a 44% increase over previous levels. While I didn’t achieve the #3 ranking that I wanted, the total time spent on the optimization was less than an hour. If I did any type of link campaign, better results would have been achieved. However, with the investment of less than one hour, 48 more visitors come to the site each month, which is nearly 600 new prospects per year. To me, that is success.

Currently, with the site in the #1 and #2 positions with the double listing traffic is up six fold and there have been some conversions with the phrase, which is excellent.

Now, if you perform SEO for clients you may be wondering how to charge. My advice is never charge by the hour – that puts you in the same place as attorneys, who are always bent out of shape. Remember, usually only half your day is spent in billable time, and the other half is dealing with problems and learning. So, come up with fixed pricing and make it easy for the customer to understand it.
The amount is up to you. What do you feel you are worth? Be fair with your customer and they will be fair with you. But make sure you do one thing the attorney does: and that is get a retainer up front. Lots of clients are very grateful for your work, but sometimes forget where their checkbook is when the bill arrives. Bill against the retainer and stop work when the retainer runs out. You would be surprised how quickly they find their checkbook when the work stops.

[berty7386]

Thanx for sharing .....................
seo India

[goranco]

I agree with everything that you said here. SEO is not complicated, it just takes time, hard work and a little bit of knowledge to go with it.

[rankontop]

yup, great instructions. keep it up.

[Blackstorm]

Nice article, but the references to the graphics are curious as there are no graphics!

Cheers!

[omniscientdate2]

very good share, I like the idea of using ppc to determine which keywords to use...cou'dn't this cost you a fortune though?