Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Has anyone submitted pages that generate sitemaps on the fly as opposed to only submitting static XML files to Bing? For instance, sitemap.php vs sitemap.xml, video sitemap.php vs videositemap.xml?

What options do we have for keyword research now that Google is switching from the Google AdWords Keyword Tool to the Keyword Planner??

A client of mine did article marketing years ago with Ezine, PRlog, ArticlesBase, etc.  Now those links are still linking to their domain.

Do you think they'll see an increase in rankings from removing those links?

Does anyone have any data that could help us to understand the best time to upload a video to YouTube?

Now that Google is debuting its new Google Adwords Keyword tool, how will this affect the way you do keyword research?

Are there other tools you use?

It was Google organic traffic as a whole that spiked. 4 or 5 keywords brought in the extra traffic, and these are keywords I usually rank in position 8 or 9 for.

I own a website, and recently had a HUGE spike in organic search traffic from Google over the weekend.

It seems to be going back down.

Anyone have any idea why? Anyone have any similar experiences?

odd-traffic.png

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304459804577281842851136290.html

Sometimes, its nice to get a pat on the back, and it's always helpful to share tactics that work!

The question is this: what's your biggest success story? Care to share any pictures or stories on how you got to the top? What do you attribute your success to?

Here's one of our success stories - one of our clients wanted to be on the first page for the keyword "Morse Code." We never thought we'd be able to get them on the top of such a competitive keyword, but alas! We never gave up.

Since this is a hobby website and not a website generating a huge amount of cash, it was easier to get incoming links from other people who were interested in the topic.

I'd say we'd attribute our success to having great content and getting others to write blog posts and join in on the fun.

What's your success story and how did you do it?

showing-off-seo.jpg

I'm pretty disappointed that I've had about 7 emails and comments on my blog about how terrible my picture was. All I wanted was some advice on how to get content in front of other bloggers, but instead, people from SEOmoz have just been emailing me and leaving comments on my website about how horrible my content is.

Bummer.

EGOL, no one asked if you liked the content, nor did anyone ask you if you would link to it.

The content was merely an example - the question remains: After you create a killer piece of content, then what? How do you get it in front of people who might link back to it?

Good answer, Keri - but after I create that content, then what? Just because its great content doesn't mean it will get in front of website owners who can link to it. Do you agree? Its not "if you build it, they will come." How do I get people to see it after I write it?

LOL, again, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how great the content is - people will not just flock to it.

Let's say I write the most magnificent article, take the most magnificent picture, or whatever, and post it to my website.

People are not going to magically just start linking to it - they have to first SEE it in order to link to it.

How do I get my websites in front of them?

"Creating amazing content" is not the answer. I want down and dirty, nitty gritty answers on how to get it done.

Coming up with kick-ass content isn't the issue. We're really good at that. Its getting people to LINK to the kick ass content that is the problem.

For instance, my team came up with this idea and took this photo:

http://tampaseo.com/2011/05/seo-for-food/

But we can't get people to link to it for the life of us. We know its funny, great content, but no links in 12 months. What the heck?

The idea of "if you create great content, people will link to you" is bogus. We're creating great content, no one is linking.

I get it, I get it... but how much AMAZING content could an air conditioning repair company create?

Need link building advice... Not content advice

Hi all!

Happy New Year!

Just wanted to pop in here and start a discussion to see what are some of the most effective link building techniques you'll be using for 2012?

-Andy

Don't get me wrong, I LOVE LOVE LOVE SEOmoz, but their "Link Directory" (www.seomoz.org/directories) is a bit deceiving.

I was looking for a list of DIRECTORIES that Moz recommends, not a bunch of places where you can pay for advertising.

On top of that, it also lists dmoz as one of the spots to get links from, but have you ever actually ever been able to get a link from dmoz? I know I haven't, and we've been trying to get a link for years.

Anyone else disappointed in this list? Does anyone have a good list of directories?

-Andy

P.S. I love you SEOmoz! Don't hate me for this critique!

Primarily questions I want to know definitive answers to:

• Do incoming links to a YouTube video affect Google's decision to show a YouTube video thumbnail in the results? If so, does YouTube rank the video higher due to incoming links?
• Does YouTube take any off-page factors into consideration when ranking a video?
• Does anyone else have any other helpful tips/thoughts/suggestions?

Please don't answer this just to get points and give me fluff information. I'd really like to get some concrete data/info

Cheers!

Wow, way to give an absolutely excellent answer. I wish I could give more than 1 thumbs up!

I created a PDF - will it pass PageRank?

No, no, no, nothing like that haha I could get more points without the effort!

I just noticed that a ton of people had great answers, but no one was giving them points!

OH! Sorry, I misunderstood.  Solid way of doing this.

What happens is both end up blocked?

Sure thing!

The post can be found here:

http://tampaseo.com/2011/03/joomla-seo-tips/

Great reply, Daniel. Thumbs up.

Yeah, I absolutely agree with Josh.  Thumbs up, Josh!

Not a problem!  If you come across any other problems, let me know, I'd love to help!

I always agree with domains with keywords in them for sure.

Are you split testing with Google Website Optimizer or another tool?

Makes sense!

Let's chat offline. Could you email me at [email protected]?

Steve,

What do you mean, "Good luck" with the SEO package from PRWeb?

Thanks,

-Andy

I'd say that I'd have to disagree with, "No point registering keyword rich domain unless it's a short lived affair."

Why is that?  I completely disagree.  Most of my successful websites all are based around keywords, and I've had them for years...

Simply put, it's a tag that solves a problem.

Problem: Dynamic web pages get into trouble with duplicate content - Google will see a completely different page if the URL is changed in any way.

For instance, Google sees these as two different sites:

www.site.com 
www.site.com/

Just the trailing / will make Google index the page twice - which required much more resources to index all of that duplicate content.

So, the rel="canonical" tag exists to tell Google which version of the content to index - thus enabling less duplicate content.

All you need to do is add the rel="canonical" tag before the tag of your website, and you're good to go!

Does this help explain it?

I agree on both counts - Webmaster Tools has great data, but only 30 days worth.

I download all of the data in Excel once a month and run reports.  I've found that to be the best way.

I always have used www.LiquidWeb.com as my hosting company - their customer support just rocks!

They don't do designing, however.

Can you give us some more information on what you're looking to do?

Hi, Ray,

Typically, directories don't often sort by alphabetical order; they allow the user to choose how they view the results, or, they sort by showing the paid listings first.

With that said, here's what I usually look like when starting a new project & choosing a domain:

• Is the domain name brand-able?
• Can I have keywords in the domain?
• Do I have the option of buying a domain with a high Page Rank?

Right now, having keywords in your domain is a pretty significant factor, but there have been rumors of Google changing it's algorithm to put less weight on the keywords in domain.

If I was in your shoes, I think I'd go with "AUCheapFlights.com" just because it's brand-able & it has keywords.

I hope this helped!

Haha there ya go, Steve!

I just don't understand.  If a question or an answer is decent, I give people a thumbs up.  I don't think I've really seen anyone else give a thumbs up.  Why not?

Maybe good keywords... maybe good traffic... but duplicate content won't get you a ton of great content

Joomla is very duplicate content challenged.  I wrote a blog post about it a while ago, but I won't link to it so I don't look like a spammer.  Here are the highlights:

1. The natural installation of Joomla comes with silly things like "print" and "pdf" icons. Both of these will lead to duplicate content issues.

2. Joomla's categories will lead to duplicate content

3. Different URL structures will lead to duplicate content issues

Still, not being indexed for the branded terms is a tough thing to be a part of.  What is the niche you are in?  Could you possibly be black listed? Is the domain new or did he buy it "used"?

I don't think it's a bad move if you have the needs of your consumers in mind.  If it's specifically for the consumer, you might think about not allowing this new category to be used.  If it's for SEO, I don't really see a lot of value there?  Maybe I'm misunderstanding?

What you need is a reoccuring payment processor of some sort.

I have used Authorize.net & PayPal - I don't know if Google checkout has that option or not, but it might be someplace to look.

For you guys, I would really recommend focusing on off-page ranking factors rather than on-page ranking factors.  On-page ranking usually only accounts for about 30% of all SEO - off page factors count for about 70.

You need more links, need a strong social media presence, and need to be publishing tons of high quality content about trade shows, trade show marketing, etc.

Your on-page SEO looks great - get rocking on off-page!

Could you give the actual keyword and domain name?

The "too many outgoing links" (less than 100 links per page) was originally created because Google could only index 101KB of a page, and so they needed some sort of rule that would help it's users.  However, this rule is no longer in place, and the guideline has been removed.  I would suggest you don't have 50000 links on a page, but your website looked fine.

Wow, I love your website - can you send me an email to [email protected] with some info?

I'm pretty sure this is the domino effect.

Google's Panda update made content farms lose Page Rank.  Therefore, outgoing Page Rank was reduced from the content farms.  A lot of us had a ton of links from content farms, which were then devalued as well.  Voilà, Page Rank reduced.

I agree, but that's not really a question, is it?

Can you show me the domain in question?