New SEO Technology focuses on TRAFFIC not backlinks… cause backlinks never put a dime in my pocket but traffic does!

I have been in this “IM” game a long time now… since 1996, when domains took weeks to get and cost hundreds of dollars to register. Since then the term “SEO” has had to evolve… in fact I don’t really remember that term even existing back then. The focus was on Yahoo, Alta Vista and I remember HOTBOT was actually pretty good for traffic too. All you had to do was keyword stuff your page and BANG… you were in.

As the years have progressed the game has changed to one of strategy and planning. Analytics are more crucial than ever and you have to constantly be staying on the pulse of what the search engines are doing. Focus needs to be on “user experience” (which with Google’s recent activities is ironic cause they are treating some of their PPC customers with a very poor experience).

The bottom line is quality needs to be a priority and it seems that any new SEO technology that emerges recently is just another attempt at gaming the system.

That is until now!

In September I opened the doors to a small beta test for my Web2Mayhem system (which sold out the 200 spots pretty much instantly) and the focus of that was to introduce my detailed training and new SEO technology software to a bunch of new people and see what kind of results they would get.

Well… lets just say that on average (yes this certainly can be backed up), the results are AWESOME. At minimum everyone is experience increased search engine rankings and traffic which is what a lot of the other people claim as “exceptional”.

Nope… that is what should be expected… NOT BRAGGED ABOUT!

All I can say is if you want to achieve more then just “increased rankings” then you are going to want to check out the amazing new SEO technology called the Web2Mayhem.

I teach extremely detailed but easy to follow step by step training that will blow you away and the tools… well all I can say is there is nothing that I know of that offers all we have for what we are charging… NOTHING!

http://www.web2mayhem.com is going to help you crush your competition with ease!

Disclaimer -> I own the web2mayhem and I use the web2mayhem and I love the web2mayhem!

Click Here Now to Download “How to Build a Business Not Just a Blog” for FREE and Learn the Right Way to Make Money Online! – Copyright JohnCow.com – All Rights Reserved

You may not realize it, but the things that will make you a Trusted Expert will also help you with your SEO (Search Engine Optimization)…

…which will improve your natural ranking with Google…

…which will help people searching for your product or service find you in the top of the search rankings…

…which makes them think of you as a Trusted Expert!

See how that works?

If you want to be a Trusted Expert (and of course you do) you need to be all over SEO.  That’s because people inherently trust natural search results more than PPC ads when they do a search.

Why?

It does not matter what the logical truth is, it’s the visceral emotional response (I am such a genius for knowing that big word) that counts, and gets people to take action.  So, if you want to be considered a Trusted Expert in a certain niche, then you need to rank well in your target keywords.

You may expect this post to be full of SEO tips and tricks, but what you don’t realize is that you’ve already been doing a lot already to improve your SEO, if you’ve been doing all the things that I’ve recommended to become a Trusted Expert (and you have been doing those things, haven’t you… cause here is the previous post in the series if you missed it Press Releases the More Technical Stuff)

- Your blog.  Google and the other search engines loves them some blogs.  Every time you post, you improve your credibility and your standing with Google.  Blogs are also a great way to target new keywords – a good blog post with the proper keyword density (2-5%) can bring you in a ton of new people if targeted correctly.

- Your online press room.  Again, Google loves anything that provides fresh content, and you’re going to be posting every single press release you send out (and again, you are sending press releases out now, right?)  This is especially important because the online press release services only keep your press releases indexed for a short time.  Anyone searching on the terms you used in those press releases after that time will be directed to your online press room/latest news area.  And if you don’t have an area for your press releases, then they’ll end up…at someone else’s websites.

Beyond your Trusted Expert content, there are a loads of basic technical things you need to be doing to improve your SEO.

• Have a Google friendly site map and submit it to the google webmaster tools.
• Use a robots.txt file.
• Add your primary keyword phrase to your title, description & keyword tags (only one time in each)
• Have your main keyword in an h1 tag (only once)
• Use your alt tags and add your primary keyword to one of them (most important is to describe the image but when possible add a keyword to one of them)
• Make sure no two titles and descriptions on your site are the same (Google often deems this as duplicate content, even though the pages might be completely different)
• Internally link to your main pages with the keyword anchor text you want to rank for (internal linking is very important and often overlooked)
• Link to related high authority resources (Google likes seeing you offering visitors relevant info and linking to high authority sites)
• Check for broken links and images (Google hates errors)

There are a lot of other tips and tricks to improve your SEO, but this is a good place to start.  Like most things about being a Trusted Expert, it all comes back to the content.  Properly targeted content not only brands you as a Trusted Expert, but it also improves your SEO and makes it easier for people to find you, which helps them to see you as a Trusted Expert.

Funny how reciprocal that is… well i think so anyway… sort of.

Click Here Now to Download “How to Build a Business Not Just a Blog” for FREE and Learn the Right Way to Make Money Online! – Copyright JohnCow.com – All Rights Reserved

This is a continuation on my posts about the tools you can use to brand your self as a Trusted Expert.

When you do a search on Google, you automatically click on the first link, don’t you?

Because if they’re the first, they must be the best in that category, right?

Not necessarily; they just have the best SEO, which makes you think they’re the best, which makes them money.  You want to be that site.

And although you can also gain a top spot on the search results through paying for an advertiser’s spot, there’s a certain cache that comes from being in the top organic results spot.  Is it a valid feeling?

Not really, since good SEO can be bought just as easily as buying a PPC advertising placement.  But that feeling exists nonetheless, that somehow the organic search result is a better, more authentic, more trustworthy site to go the than the one that is blatantly advertising.  And since feelings are what ultimately drive the buying process, not rational thought, this is not something you want to ignore.

SEO isn’t this mysterious thing that only guys you pay over $100 an hour can understand.  Once you understand the methodologies behind it, and how it works, it’s easy for you to make changes yourself to the way your site is viewed by the search engines to boost your rankings.

Oh, and by the way, don’t say SEO optimization; since SEO stands for ‘search engine optimization’ you’re actually saying search engine optimization optimization. Which sounds dumb.  Sorry, that’s a pet peeve of mine.

There are two different components to successful SEO: what you do to your site internally, and the things you do externally.  Both of these will determine what your Google rankings will be on your chosen keywords. Within your site, it’s all about taking advantage of the opportunities that already exist.  Later in this series we’ll delve deeper into exactly how you can improve your SEO yourself.

Click Here Now to Download “How to Build a Business Not Just a Blog” for FREE and Learn the Right Way to Make Money Online! – Copyright JohnCow.com – All Rights Reserved

Have you seen the commercials?

They’ve been everywhere lately – making fun of keyword groupings and how one search for one thing can end up with search results for something completely different.

Bing.com has been marketing themselves as a different kind of search engine, according to them, a “decision” engine instead of a “search” engine.

What I found really interesting about the Bing.com commercials is that nowhere do they mention that they are a Microsoft product, which is one of the most recognizable brands in the world.  If you had a new product launch, wouldn’t you want to capitalize on that notoriety?

Apparently, not, although they don’t seem to mind using the deep Microsoft products to pay for the big advertising campaign.

And anyone who’s ever been on the internet knows what Microsoft is trying to do with Bing – they’re trying to take a piece out of the big boys, which, as everyone knows, is Google.  Google is the king of search engines.  When we talk about keywords, PPC ads, SEO and search rankings, it’s all in relation to Google.

Bing’s latest step to search engine, sorry, that’s ‘decision’ engine, domination is to strike a deal with Yahoo for all of its users to use Bing for all their decision needs. The terms of the deal are still being hammered out, but when the deal goes through, it will give Bing not only a larger share in the search market, allowing it to creep up on the monolith of Google, but it will also eliminate a competitor.

And what does Yahoo get out of it?

Well, first off, it wouldn’t have to maintain its own search infrastructure anymore.  And according to the deal as it stands now, they would get a share of the revenue of ads both on the Yahoo search site as well as Bing.com, which is not bad considering that they are already losing market share to Bing.

If these guys can make this deal work out, then they both stand to benefit.  As the bigwigs over at Yahoo point out, their search engine is not their major business focus.  And Microsoft has the motivation and the money to put behind become a force to be reckoned with in search – and they’ve already got distribution channels all lined up through their own products.

Part of the details that still need to be worked out is whether they will use the existing Yahoo Panama system for buying ads or switch over to Microsoft’s AdCenter.

I personally vote for AdCenter – it’s better than Panama, and is almost on par with Google’s AdWords.

Once the deal goes through, you’d better believe that I’ll be watching Bing and Google to see how this will affect PPC campaigns and search engine rankings.  While Google is still the king, Bing is starting to look like…well, I can’t think of a historical reference that isn’t too obscure that actually fits, but Bing is like the guy that’s trying to slowly and carefully take over the throne while the King has become complacent is his authority and position.

Anyone got a good reference for that?

PS – I would love to see Google get some true competition here… I think it will make both services that much better!

Now this is all just my own opinion… whats yours?

Click Here Now to Download “How to Build a Business Not Just a Blog” for FREE and Learn the Right Way to Make Money Online! – Copyright JohnCow.com – All Rights Reserved

There are two ways to get your site seen in search engines.  Either pay for PPC advertising (Google Adwords) or improve your SEO so that you have a better natural ranking.  A lot of people go with the PPC way because they find the SEO part too daunting.

But what about paying someone to help you with your SEO?

If you think it would be too expensive, think about it this way: although you have to pay for SEO help, it will improve your search ranking.  And, unlike PPC advertising, that SEO ranking doesn’t go away once you finish paying.

So then amortize that SEO cost over the next year and compare it to what you’re spending on PPC over the same time period.  Seem more affordable now?  I thought so.

The next thing you have to do is find someone reputable to help you with your SEO.  And, of course, I have something for you.  James Harrison at http://seobythehour.com is exactly what he purports to be – an SEO specialist that you can hire by the hour.  Charges vary depending on the number of hours that your purchase.

So why this guy rather than someone else?  Well, he managed to make his own site the #1 search result for “freelance SEO specialist”.  The proof is in the pudding; you wouldn’t want someone to work on your SEO who couldn’t do it for himself.

Also, all the services he provides are 100% organic and can be backed by Google’s Webmaster Guidelines and MSN’s Search Engine Optimization’s Best Practices. He prides himself on never having gotten a site banned and he only practices natural SEO techniques proven to obtain organic search results.

Here’s a sample of the services that SEO By the Hour offers:

• Keyword and Competition Research
• Content Writing and Keyword Placement
• Meta Data – Title, Keywords and Descriptions
• SEO Web Design – Website Architecture, Sitemaps and Internal Linking
• Website Indexing and Submissions
• Technical SEO: Rewriting and URL Canonicalization
• HTML and CSS Validation
• Link Building and Popularity
• Article Writing and Submissions
• Social Media Optimization
• Brand and Business Reputation
• Directory Submissions
• Local Search Engine Optimization
• Blog Optimization and Blogging
• Pay-Per-Click Management
• Lead Generation and Mailing List Development

So unless you’re dong all of those things already, there are improvements that you could be making in your SEO.  And if you need help doing it (which you most likely do) go to http://seobythehour.com to find out more about what James can do for your website and its organic ranking.

Click Here Now to Download “How to Build a Business Not Just a Blog” for FREE and Learn the Right Way to Make Money Online! – Copyright JohnCow.com – All Rights Reserved

When you think about Search Engine Optimization, you generally don’t think “that’s funny.” As any webmaster can tell you, trying to keep up with the changes in the algorithms Google uses for its searches is like trying to herd cats. SEO is more likely to lead to frustration than it is to laughter. Enter Ranked Hard

Ranked Hard is a monthly webcomic drawn by Kelly Ishikawa and written by the folks at Big Oak – an SEO company. These folks know the ins and the outs, the ups and downs of the SEO biz, and it shows. From their commentary on Black Hat SEO to their take on Google Adwords, the Big Oak folks take no prisoners, and leave you laughing all along the way.

Most of the time, the comic is so spot-on that you wonder where the fictional Ranked Hard SEO company and the real Big Oak begins. Such is the world of SEO.

One of the more compelling things about Ranked Hard, though, isn’t the comics themselves; it’s the discussions that the comics engender. It’s almost hilarious to watch people who obviously take themselves too seriously get worked up by a simple webcomic. Even some of the so-called “celebrity” SEO experts, lampooned in September’s comic, showed up to say exactly how hilarious they thought Ranked Hard was.
Ranked Hard is full of inside jokes. If you’re not intimately familiar with the SEO field, chances are you’re going to miss some of the major funny. On the other hand, Ranked Hard does sometimes provide sort of a meta-narrative by way of character discussions (See, for example, “Cutt Her Some Slack”) so you won’t always be completely lost if you’re an SEO neophyte.

My one complaint about Ranked Hard is its infrequency. A month is just too long to wait between installments. Here’s to hoping the Big Oak folks can find a way (or the time) to step up their production of Ranked Hard.

Check them out now at http://www.rankedhard.com/

Click Here Now to Download “How to Build a Business Not Just a Blog” for FREE and Learn the Right Way to Make Money Online! – Copyright JohnCow.com – All Rights Reserved

If you are a regular visitor to the JohnCow homestead, you will have noticed that we have done a little rennovating around here and we are very happy with it so far. We still have a few minor things we want to do but for the most part we are VERY HAPPY!

So Why the Redesign?

The previous JohnCow template was fantastic. The colors, images and everything was very nice looking and it was a great template, the problem however was with the templates functionality.

1. Above the Fold: When designing or selecting a template, one of the first things you want to ensure is that your main action needs to be above the fold. What this means is if you want subscribers or buyers you want the offer to be immediately viewable as soon as they land of your blog.

The previous template had a huge header graphic and as a result there was a lot of wasted real estate that did nothing but look nice. With the new template we now have our highest priority offer (opt in) in the header area, making it immediately viewable and have shrank the hieght of the header so it allowed for other action items below to move up higher.

2. Move non action items to the footer: The old template had a cool looking footer but it did not allow for much information to be added. This in turn caused us to have to jam everything into the sidebar of the template and caused some distraction from people seeing the items we wanted them to take action on.

With the new template we now have much more room to be able to ensure we have everything available on the page but it is not jammed into the side bar and distracting the reader from what we feel is first priority.

3. Internal Functionality: The internal structure of the template was also a huge improvement for us. Most templates have the same basc structure and as a result if you are trying to update the template, you need to try and find where that code is in the main templates and if you are not savvy at php and html, it can be a bit of a challenge.

With our new design it takes full advantage of WordPress’s powerful widget technology and all the main areas that are most likely to see changes now use widgets.

There are also more php pages within the template, for example the top navigation on the page is a template page all to itself.  This allows for much more control when updating and editing the templates.

Whats Left to Update?: There are only a few small changes left to do and this has to do with creating custom template pages for thankyou pages (remove action items that will confuse people from thinking they might not have already opted in) and opt-in landing pages (such as the ebook page and soon to be Keyword Corral page) that we want the focus to be on the content and getting people to sign up rather then other banners and links.

So, there you have it… the reasons for the updrade!

I also want to give a HUGE THANKYOU to Hyder over at http://www.weborithm.com/ for doing such a fantastic job on this template. If you are ready to take your blog to the next level and are interested in your own custom template, I 100% recommend you check them out. Draw out what you want and http://www.weborithm.com/ will be able to do it for you.

So, what I want to know is…

[poll id="10"]

Click Here Now to Download “How to Build a Business Not Just a Blog” for FREE and Learn the Right Way to Make Money Online! – Copyright JohnCow.com – All Rights Reserved

As we hope we have been able to get across, one of the greatest things about using different “Web 2.0″ sites is the ability to own more then one result in the top 10 of Google with your content.

The problem is with Google’s “duplicate content filters” and if you are using only one variation of the content that you submit to the different sites you are pretty limited on how effective you can be. Of course you are already aware of this but it is just so much damn work… you create a great piece of content and then having to rewrite it over and over again… it is sooooo painful.

Here are two very simple “FREE” tricks that may.. and we stress “may” help you rewrite your content in a fraction of the time. These do not work in all situations and are not good for everyone but some of you will love them. With both of these methods, sometimes the resulting content can be very confusing and is almost easier just to rewrite the content from scratch but do test these out for yourself and see what you think.

Tip #1 Auto Summarize

With some of the sites you submit to you do not have to add the entire article, you can instead submit a 200 word summary of the content. We use this on sites like clipmarks.com and tumblr.com

To create a summary, simply use the Microsoft Word “Auto Summarize” feature. To use this feature click on the “Tools” menu inside MS Word and then click “AutoSummarize. . .”, then select the “Create a new document and put it there” and select 50% in the drop down menu (or less if you want).

Here is a helpful link to info about how to find and use it within MS Word. . .

http://www.microsoft.com/education/autosummarize.mspx

IMPORTANT –> Make sure to copy, paste and save the final document into a NotePad document (.txt) with the reason for this being MS Word will add extra hidden formatting characters that get copied into your posts and become formatting nightmares. By saving the document as a notepad .txt you remove all those extra characters. We wish MS Word would come out with the ability to copy clean text with no formatting… but no such luck yet.

If you do not own MS Word then there are some online tools for this and one of them is located at. . .

http://www.pertinence.net/ps/main.jsp?ui.lang=en

Tip #2 Google Translate

Step 1: Go to http://translate.google.com/ and enter your original content in the text box.

Step 2: Select to translate from “English” to “Spanish” and then click “Translate”

Step 3: On the right hand side of the screen, highlight and copy the spanish version and now paste it back into the text box.

Step 4: Select to translate from “Spanish” to “English” and click translate and voila you have a rewritten article. You will of course need to edit it so it reads well

If you need more then one variation, repeat this with the different languages.

Just a couple little tips on a summer weekend that we hope you find useful. If you have any tips you want to add, leave a comment below and I will add them to this post with a link to your site.

Click Here Now to Download “How to Build a Business Not Just a Blog” for FREE and Learn the Right Way to Make Money Online! – Copyright JohnCow.com – All Rights Reserved

A couple days ago we talked about how to structure your content for different web 2.0 sites and today we are going to talk a little about optimizing the content for better results.

Our number one rule for content is always to put the human reader first. Content that is first created for pleasing the search engines is content that is not focused on providing value and is usually very shallow and short lived.

Once you have finished created your content for the reader it is easy to go back in and optimize it for the search engines (to help boost its rankings) and it is very easy to do.

Here are the basics that we try to cover within our content before we submit to sites squidoo, gather, hubpages and ezinearticles.

1. Always have the keyword in the title and if possible make sure it is in the first half of the title.

2. Do not have a keyword density of more then 6% max. That means that in a 500 word article, if your keyword phrase is made of three words (Product Name Review), then you would not repeat it more then 10 times within the article. This however is the absolute max and is usually too many times in our opinion. We recommend that you focus on making sure the content reads well above everything else and then if possible try to mention the keyword…

• Once in the opening sentence of the opening paragraph
• Once in the last sentence of the opening paragraph
• Once or twice in the middle paragraphs
• Once in the last paragraph

Whenever we have the keyword more then that, we will use an alternative phrase in place of it. So for example if the keyword we are using is “Johncow eBook Review”, if we mentioned this phrase more then the above listed amount of times we would use a variation such as “Opinion of the eBook by Johncow”.

3. What about adding bold <b> and italicized <i> to the content? The issue is this is not content on your blog, this is for content on web 2.0 sites that can get a little picky about content that looks like it is overoptimized and spammy. This is just our personal opinion but content that we have submitted that we over optimized seems to get flagged and / or voted down, way more then content that we just do a little optimization with. If you use the bold or italicized, make sure that you do it in a way that is logical to the reader and highlights a point that you are trying to stress… do NOT just bold and highlight the keyword.

4. One last thing, always try to make sure no paragraph is more then 3 sentences in length. This is a psychological thing with readers and smaller paragraphs have proven to work better at keeping the reader interested in your content then long paragraphs.

Update–> this was mentioned in the comment below from and was a good point that we wanted to add for this, so thanks Steve (CraftsBlog.co.uk) for mentioning it…

“Also from a structural point of view if you move on to a new point always start a new paragraph. This allows the jist of the article to be understood by skim readers who just look at the start of each paragraph.”

That’s it… there is really nothing more then that

Hope at least one of you got something form this… if so let us know

Click Here Now to Download “How to Build a Business Not Just a Blog” for FREE and Learn the Right Way to Make Money Online! – Copyright JohnCow.com – All Rights Reserved

We firmly believe that the absolute most important part of using social media (Web 2) sites is the content you submit. Without good content you will not get your articles ranking in the search engines and even if you do get the rankings you will not get any conversions.

There are different types of online social marketing sites available to use. There are some that allow you to bookmark, some leave little comments or posts and others that allow you to create your own little page such as Squidoo.com, Hubpages.com, Ning.com, Google Notebook & Ezinearticles.com. It is these sites that the content we talk about in this post is focused on being used on.

The majority of people out there trying to earn money with these types of sites are often too focused on quantity rather then quality. They will outsource the content or spin it without taking the time to ensure it reads well and is informative. Your first priority needs to be focusing on the human visitor. You can then go back and tweak the content slightly to better optimize it for the search engines, which we will
explain more about later on.

The simplest and most effective method that we use for creating good “human focused” content is to follow the simple formula A.I.D.A. which stands for…

A – Attention: Get the persons attention right away. This is where your title (headline) comes into play. You will want to right away grab the attention of the reader and for an example, say we were promoting a page on our site that was a weight loss pre sales affiliate page for “Supplement X” and our keyword was “supplement x reviews”; our headline (content title) might be…

“Most Supplement X Reviews Are Full Of Crap, I Stopped Using It and I Will Tell You Why!”

Now, this might seem aggressive to some, but if you were looking for a supplement x review, would this not get your attention?

I – Interest: Now that you got their attention it is time to get their interest in what you are talking about. Following the above example, if our main purpose is to promote this product, this is where we have to pull the reader in and get them interested in learning more.

We have taken the stance that we will be slamming the product but in reality we will not be, the title was just to get their attention. You may want to start by explaining why other reviews are so fake and how it is so hard to know what is real out there. Peak their interest in what you have to say so they keep reading. It is very important that you relate to them right away as well. Remember, this is just an example of a strategy to try… you can write this however you want.

D – Desire: You got their attention, peaked their interest in learning more and so now it is time to spark a desire. In this example we would now need to make sure to come clean and explain what was meant about quitting supplement x. Maybe take the stance that we quit early on because of forgetting to take the supplement and then a month later started up again and we soon realized that quitting was the worse mistake we made because the product worked.

Make sure to explain the benefits of the product and how it will help. Do not just say something like “lose weight” instead you will want to highlight exactly what the benefits of this feature is. So you might say something like…

“Helped me to fit into my size 32 pants from a size 38 in only 30 days”

A – Action: This is now were you tell them how they can quench that desire. This is also where many people fail because they make a weak call to action and just leave the reader hanging. It is so important that you tell the reader exactly what to do. Do not just put something like a keyword linked to your page or use “Click Here” because this does not tell the reader why they need to take that action. Instead tell them why to “Click Here”.

A couple examples may be…

“Click Here Now to Learn How Easy it is to Get Started”

“Get complete access to this incredible system by Clicking Here Now”

You will want to reemphasize the benefits and encourage the reader that this is one of the smartest things they will ever do.

IMPORTANT: You will want to ensure you have linked to your page with the keyword but we also recommend you use a call to action word such as “Click Here”, these get much better clickthroughs then just the keyword. You can add a nofollow to the click here link if you like

It is also important to understand that this type of content is not for every social site, these are meant more for the sites that allow you to create a page that you own. Some sites however frown upon this type of content and do not like call to actions in the content and get up tight if there are more then 2 links in the content. Do not be discouraged if your content gets taken down from some sites, learn and tweak and try again. Remember though, the whole purpose is to get the reader to take an action and visit your blog.. so use the content to convince them that they need to do that.

TIPS: Grab a notepad and a pencil and rough out the outline of the content. It is easier to start it out this way then on a computer. Also, create your headline first and then the article… this helps guide you as to what to write about.

Once you have your content ready, you are going to want to optimize the content (we will talk about this tomorrow) and we will also show you how to make a few variations of one article for a few different sites

So, did you get anything worthwhile from this post?

Click Here Now to Download “How to Build a Business Not Just a Blog” for FREE and Learn the Right Way to Make Money Online! – Copyright JohnCow.com – All Rights Reserved

Yesterday we posted about content with purpose and it brought up a question about “Duplicate Content” and we figured that we better address this before we get into talking about actually posting content on different social media sites. A word of warning however, the following is 100% our opinion only and is based on what we have seen from our result.

1. Duplicate Content is More then Just the Body of the Content

Duplicate content is not just focused on the content body itself but it can be due to other page factors such as the page title and meta description. Basically Google has a goal and that is to offer the best search results they possible can and to achieve that they want to ensure that the results are not simply multiple copies of the same content. This is especially important for on your own blog when you have two articles that are on the same topic but are completely different.

If you put the same title and or description on both pages there is a huge chance that Google will actually consider one a duplication of the other. They figure that if the two pages are talking about the same thing then why should they display both pages.

So the first thing is always ensure your blog has a unique title and description for every page.

2. Do Not Post Content on Another Site and Then Link to the Same Content on Your Site

This may sound obvious but we see it often and what happens is people will create an article, then submit it to an article directory or even another blog and then link to the exact same article on their own blog.

This is pretty much a waste of time since Google is going to only use one version of the content. Instead make sure to always modify your content as much as possible before you link it back to the original content. Remember, you want to own multiple spots in the top 10 for your keyword and by modifying the content you can do that.

3. Using a Snippet of the Content and Linking to the Source Content?

In yesterday’s post i mentioned having content with purpose and part of that was to…

• Give part of the answer but leave them wanting more
• Give them the exact steps to get the rest of the story

What we meant by this was not just giving them part of the article (such as the first paragraph) and then telling them to read the rest of the article by clicking here. Yes you can use this strategy but what we actually mean by this is that you give them some of the answers to their problem but do not give them everything.

You want them to feel like they got value and learned something but if you tell them everything then they have no need to visit your site. On the other hand if you only give them a tiny little taste (like the first paragraph) then you more then likely have not been able to tell them enough to get them interested.

Give them enough to show you know what you are talking about, that you can relate to their situation and that you can help them with their problem… then give them a link to follow.

OK, we know this is not exactly a duplicate content issue but we felt it was something to address none the less

4. Duplicate Content will NOT banish your site:

We blame Internet marketers for this rumor and the reason is they are putting the fear of God into people about duplicate content in order to sell what ever it is they have.

Duplicate content is not a great thing but it is not the evil enemy of Google either. You kind of got to use a little common sense here (yes we know it is not so common).

Think about news sites and popular blogs… they post other peoples content all the time and the reason is the content is worth while and something worth sharing. The issue is when 100% of your content is duplicate content and you are offering nothing new to your readers, then it can cause issues.

If you do post other peoples content on your blog then we recommend you make sure you have one unique post for every duplicate post. It is also wise to make sure your page title and description are different then what others have published.

Also, if you submit an article with an article distribution service, you are NOT in danger of punishing your site. What these services do is blast the same article out to 1000′s of article directories and the idea is to get loads of back links. The issue is this content is all duplicate content and Google pretty much has lost all respect for article directory links from 95% of the directories. Now that does not mean the links are worthless… but they just are not all that fantastic. Also since the content is duplicate, they will only show one or maybe two at the most of your articles in their results… which means very limited traffic.

What will not happen is Google will NOT punish your site or blog for this. If this was the case then all you would have to do is submit the same article to loads of sites and link to your competitors and you could eliminate them all.

5. How Unique Does the Content Need to Be?

This question always seems to come up and the simple answer is as much as possible. The bare minimum however, in our opinion, is to ensure that the title and description are 100% unique and then make sure the body of the content is at least 30% unique.

We have done tests and have seen that making the title and description unique has made the biggest impact. So if your really lazy then at least make your titles and descriptions unique.

Summary:

It basically comes down to the question of are you focused on just getting back links or are you focused on getting traffic!

When you are using article directories or social media sites like Squidoo and Hubpages, you want to ensure that all your submitted content ranks well in the search engines. By putting the same content on all the sites, sure you get back links but only one of the sites will appear in the rankings for that focused term. If you make sure there is unique content on each of those sites then you can potentially rank in the top 10 with each one!

So which one would you rather have… one search result and multiple back links or multiple search results and multiple rankings?

Any comments or questions?

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