Search Engine Optimization Tips Blog

Google ignores certain words (known as stop words) – but not all the time. In years past, lists of words that might be ignored were posted hither and yon as well as on this blog, but in September of 2009 Google tweaked the way they treat stop words and the ball game changed a little.

According to Google Help:

Exceptions to ‘Every word matters’

* Words that are commonly used, like ‘the,’ ‘a,’ and ‘for,’ are usually ignored (these are called stop words). But there are even exceptions to this exception. The search [ the who ] likely refers to the band; the query [ who ] probably refers to the World Health Organization — Google will not ignore the word ‘the’ in the first query.
* Synonyms might replace some words in your original query. (Adding + before a word disables synonyms.)
* A particular word might not appear on a page in your results if there is sufficient other evidence that the page is relevant. The evidence might come from language analysis that Google has done or many other sources. For example, the query [ overhead view of the bellagio pool ] will give you nice overhead pictures from pages that do not include the word ‘overhead.’

A little more information is revealed n this snippet from Google Guide:

To improve search performance, Google ignores (doesn’t index) common words called stop words (such as the, is, on, or, of, how, why, as well as certain single digits and single letters). Stop words are so common that they do little to narrow a search, and therefore they can safely be discarded. The indexer also ignores some punctuation and multiple spaces, as well as converting all letters to lowercase, to improve Google’s performance.

However, you can override this default:

To force Google to search for a particular term, put a + sign operator in front of the word in the query. Note that you should not put a space between the + and the word. So, to search for the satirical newspaper The Onion, use [ +The Onion ], not [ + The Onion ].

The + operator is typically used in front of stop words that Google would otherwise ignore or when you want Google to return only those pages that match your search terms exactly. However, the + operator can be used on any term.

Want to learn about Star Wars Episode One? “I” is a stop word and is not included in a search unless you precede it with a + sign.

* USE [ Star Wars +I ]

Knowing how to search properly can save loads of time in research, and also help you work out keyword phrases that aren’t as clunky, as you can use stop words to make the flow of your text more natural.

Conducting keyword research is more than using Google tools and Trends to ping high traffic keywords or niche search phrases. Focusing on words that show good demand does no good if they don’t specifically map to what you are offering. Ranking high for a non-relevant high-volume keyword is a waste of time and resources. If search marketing is the ‘database of intent’, you need to look further than immediate or periodic demand and discover the “intent” behind search.

It’s easy to come up with a list of keywords that directly reflect teh thrust of your site. You can then extrapolate from there by thinking about your locale, demographic, brand, objective, and other factors to expand your base. There is another layer, however, and it consists of the following:

Internal search (how the consumer navigates your site: where they go, what they look at, and when they exit)

Visitors from organic search (SERPs results for keyword driven search)

Visitors from paid search (advertising campaigns such as AdWords)

Identify who is searching for you, how they do it, and where they come from. Concentrate on the people that convert – what did you do right? How can you attract more people like them? How do they search, where do they search, what page do they enter your website at and how do they move through your site?

You should be able to extrapolate data and analyze it for trends that are directly specific to your website and indicative of web-search as a whole. Use this information to formulate new campaigns.

Don’t stop with mere SEO. Use what you have learned from the way searchers react to your keyword choices to discover more and better ways to optimize.

You can’t simply start using advertising online without setting some boundaries concerning words you do NOT want your ads to appear for.

Keyword targeting

When you look into advertising your website online, you will probably be dealing with one of the major search engine companies and their specialized ad targeted programs. You’ll be paying for every time your ad is shown or clicked on, depending on your plan. The most common forms involve purchasing specific keywords that you wish your ad to appear in response to.

If you wish to market a particular product, such as a natural cure for sinusitis, you will want to target words like sinusitis cure, sinus remedy, etc. However, perhaps you don’t want people feeding the cure to their children for legal reasons, so exclude words such as ‘kids cold’  ‘kid sinus infection’, baby cold, etc. Once you start to receive response to your ads you can refine your keyword list to maximize your traffic.

Think about how consumers search when choosing your keywords. Ask yourself what you would type in if you were searching for a product like the one you sell. begin by writing down a list of all the different categories your product could fit into, and then add sales words like best, natural, organic, favorite, cheap and affordable.

Geo-targeting is also a good idea if you have a physical store location and want to advertise it as well. Simply add  keywords such as NY, Seattle, South Side or the Bay area to your list.

One of the most common ways to pay for advertising is based on CPM, or ‘cost-per-thousand impressions’. (M is the Roman numeral for a thousand) An impression is the showing of your ad in response to a searcher using one or more of the keywords you specified. A rate of $30 CPM would mean you are charged $30 for every thousand times your ad is shown. Getting the most sales out of your impressions is what keyword targeting is all about. (Some also use pay per click, which we will deal with in the next blog post as the approach is slightly different- you don’t pay every time it’s shown, but every time it is clicked on.)

How Negative Keywords can be a Positive for Your Business

Negative (or excluded) keywords are a way for website owners to prevent their site from showing up on keyword searches. Remember, many websites still pay CPM instead of pay per click, meaning they are charged for advertising based on how many times their ad appears in response to searches by consumers.

If you run a website that sells exclusively women’s shoes, you probably want your ad to pop up in responses to searches that include combinations of the keywords shoes, boots, women, female, and a multitude of variations.

But what if some-one runs a search for ‘men’s shoes’? If your ad pops every time shoes is input, this search will produce your ad as well. You will pay for these views, and have a slim to none chance of making a sale.

Good news, though – you can exclude certain keywords, which will help you narrow your audience to those who are interested in your product. By making men, men’s, male, masculine and other variations of the word ‘negative’ for appearances of your ads on search, you can reduce the number of wasted views considerably. (While Google uses the term ‘negative’ for these keywords, Yahoo refers to them as ‘excluded’. These mean the same thing).

Now you will still get views from consumers searching for shoes, women’s shoes, and woman’s boots, but any search with the word men or a variation thereof will not show your ad. This should increase your conversion rate and ROI substantially.

As always,  trial and error will be the norm until you figure out the proper balance of keywords to include or exclude so you get the most out of your advertising budget.

One of the most important steps of search engine optimization is keyword analysis. Search engine optimizers begin their SEO efforts by doing an extensive keyword analysis, and then move on to other aspects. Understanding how keyword analysis affects search engine optimization requires coming to grips with what keyword analysis really is, followed by a crash course in how to carry it out.

All organic searches on Google are triggered by entries by users. Specific search queries contain relevant words known as keywords. For example, all three words in “Florida home foreclosure” form a single keyword, and the phrase ‘home foreclosure’ is also a keyword. Your website must be optimized for sets of keywords; the choice which ones to target is influenced by keyword analysis.

Google has a tool known as the Google AdWords keyword tool, which can be easily used by anyone for keyword analysis. Additional software is used to generate a comprehensive report on each keyword. Keyword analysis typically will include the popularity of specified keywords, the number of search queries for the keywords and   record of the keyword’s search history over a period of time.

A SEO will base his or her his choice of keywords not just on statistics, but on trends and current events as well as season and other factors. Even very specific keywords (known as a niche keywords) can help increase traffic to a website. For example, a dentist’s website should be optimized for keywords like “dental care”, but a smart search engine optimizer will also optimize a website for “dental health, invisible braces” and so on because people will search for these as well.  Keyword selection is not just based on stats and figures; you have to get inside the heads of the people you are trying to attract.

Search engine optimizers usually base their keyword selection on more than one targeted group, and effective keyword analysis should take into account the advertising competition for each keyword. The higher the advertising competition and payout per click, the more competitive a keyword usually is.

Optimizing a website for competitive keywords can take years. For example, the first few websites that come up for the keyword “home loan” have established links and insane PageRank, making them very hard to beat. better to try ‘Home loan Santa Barbara’ or ‘home loans for newlyweds.”

In conclusion, keyword analysis should take into account the following:

• Number of searches
• Advertising competition
• Possibilities as a niche keyword

Search engine optimization is based on keywords, and if a search engine optimizer chooses the wrong set of keywords to target then all of your work will be for nothing!

An RSS feed can be a terrific way to get extra, targeted traffic and increase your site’s keyword content.

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) was formerly ignored by search engine optimizers; since RSS feeds were not indexed and cached by search engines, they didn’t see the point. However, SEO experts are now completely aware of the benefits of RSS feeds for search engine optimization – and if they aren’t, they should be!

Since search engines like Google started indexing and caching content from RSS feeds it became increasingly possible to harness the power of RSS for search engine optimization. Search engine optimizers know that web content must be updated and added to regularly to maintain high search engine rankings. Since RSS is by nature dynamic, this makes feeds the perfect way to pump up your site.

RSS feeds are easy to implement, and are available on nearly any topic you can think of. If you put multiple RSS feeds on your site, you increase incoming traffic. The best technique is to implement RSS feeds for popular search phrases. If you add an RSS feed displaying top search engine results for targeted keywords, you may be able to boost your site a few steps up the ranks by piggybacking on the SEO value of those feeds.

Majorr search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN offer RSS feeds that can be easily tacked to your website. One thing to remember is to check and make sure that the RSS feeds you choose can be used on your website. Many search engine feeds are restricted for use on non-commercial websites only.

Ading search engine RSS feesd allows you to boost the density of target keywords and increases dynamic content on your website. In addition, inserting RSS feeds practically guarantees that fresh content is generated and added to your site on a regular basis. News RSS feeds can present a wide variety of topics to work with. Some types of software even permit blending of multiple RSS feeds to create a single site feed.

Don’t forget that JavaScript based RSS solutions are not indexed easily by search engines. They are easy to implement, but JavaScript offers very little in terms of search engine optimization. ASP, PHP, and HTML alternatives for RSS are readily available and are much better choice.

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