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The Great SEO Experiment conclusion
30/10/09 – Football, is a game of two halves. Link-optmise, has reached the end of the first forty five minutes of play, and the score is currently 2-2. This may not be making much sense, so read on.
When we started Link-optimise, we felt we had a good idea on how to design and build an SEO website, and push it up the search engine rankings. What we actually knew was a small fraction of what was needed for full search engine optimisation. So as the site was three months old on the 20/10/2009, and after careful analysis of data from Google Analytics, we now feel what is needed is a complete redesign of the website. Well almost, we’re keeping the robot.
So what did the Analytic data tell us?
In three months the site was visited 257 times. Just over half of the people that visited it, returned at least once. The sites most popular pages were the resources page, the news page, and this one, the great seo experiment.
People from 15 countries visited the site, from every continent in the world. Time on the pages was quite pleasing, the average being just over four minutes. Though we had a bounce rate of just over 50%, this slowly declined as time went by.
Where we feel improvement is needed, predominantly concerns the services and contact pages of the site. These got around 227 visits, yet only two people contacted us for a quotation. Therefore this has to change. The new direction of the site, we feel addresses this issue, while we continue to retain and provide resources for SEO.
During our discussions, we also came up with targeted keywords and areas to generate custom for our business. What is after all a very competitive area of web design, this direction should help us attract more visitors, if not custom.
SEO Experiment results.
Back-links – Forum posts provide fast back links and direct traffic. We were surprised that our fourth biggest referrer was an SEO forum. People are curious about websites, so a post on forums like these is not a bad idea. The downside is, they are closed archived, and you can lose the link. Some are no-follows from the outset. Social media sites do not always offer a good back-link to a site, but they do offer a way of site promotion. Linking as many together as possible, is always a good idea. Other good back links, are press releases, article submissions, and some company directories. Many of the latter though, are not listed on Web Master Tools as a back-link. They do tend to offer a good source of direct traffic.
Anchor text – This is about relating similar words to the anchor text on your site. We struggled with this until we started thinking laterally on the subject. So if you are writing about red wine, work in words and phrases that are connected to wine. White, burgundy, and so on. The more the merrier. Think of anchor text as a net in which you capture traffic.
Keywords – Keywords are not quite what they used to be. Our findings were that keyword density did not play that much of a part, but linking your keywords to your anchor text did. This help to target the “traffic-net” as much as possible. Whether your copy is for site pages or blogs, you should always look to write the copy in this way, engaging with your reader to keep their eyes on your site. Update your pages regularly. This does make a difference to your Google PR.
Tags – All the tags have to be top draw. Alt, title, all help get the search engine robots to search in your direction. Don’t neglect these.
Meta data – Meta data is not quite the dead duck we thought it was. The trick is to write copy that offers a unique service if you have one. This is eye-catching to searchers, who may see a lot of similar copy on a search page. Something that stands out, is more likely to be clicked on.
Focus on niche keywords – We would love to be near the top for the keyword “SEO services”, but until we hit around 800 back-links, that is not going to happen anytime soon. If your industry is competitive, then try and choose keywords that are relevant and unique, as you will find it more successful than the standard fare. Just don’t make them too unique as this will make them redundant.
Our test site, www.teahon.co.uk, which was flittering between pages 22-31 on Google. Now resides on page 7, following searches for freelance writer, on pages on the UK, using the above methods.
These were our results, we will no doubt kick off the second half as soon as the redesign is up and running. We hope these help to shed some light on search engine optimisation.
Written by Richard Teahon
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Written by Richard Teahon
The Great SEO Experiment
When two people who are experts in their respective SEO fields get together and say it would be a good idea to start an SEO company, it sounds like a great idea on the surface. But just how well can they cut it? Follow The Great SEO Experiment and find out.
27/06/09 – Site name www.link-optimise.com is bought, and domain procured. The first webcopy is written for the site, and the layout for the design is started.
28/06/09 – Initial layout is impressive.
29/06/09 - The pictures are made search engine friendly, and html is optimised for SEO. Links are made more user friendly by adding title tags. Some meta data is added.
30/06/09 - New site pages are designed and added.
01/07/09 - Meeting is held to discuss what is offered to potential clients, and pricing.
02/07/09 - Logo is redesigned for each page. Layout and navigation impressive.
03/07/09 - More webcopy is written for the site. Layout of contact page is changed to make it more user friendly. Privacy policy, and terms and conditions page discussed.
05/07/09 - The beta version of the site goes live. Much work still to do, but it is looking impressive.
05/07/09 - First SEO blog posts are published. The plan is that once the site is finalised then at least one blog per day will be published.
07/07/09 – Early feedback of site design from non Link-optimise staff is positive
10/07/09 – Meeting is scheduled for 18/07/09 to finalise much of the site content, including policies such as terms and conditions. This is crucial to the site as it is in effect the setting out of service level agreements to potential clients.
11/07/09 – Changes to webcopy are discussed. Deadline for site completion is set to 19/07/09.
14/07/09 – A Google search for Link-optimise, shows the site is number one on the page. This shows that search engine robots have started to crawl through the site organically.
18/09/09 – Meeting was held and all remaining issues were thrashed out and a plan set. Terms and conditions, and privacy policy were finalised and copy written, as were drafts of page descriptions for the site. These descriptions are necessary for SEO. Once the descriptions have been OK’d, then they should be uploaded to the site tomorrow. The service copy is written and uploaded to the site, together with contact details.
19/09/09 – Some of the copy is changed after proof reading, and title tags are added. The site is made Wc3 compliant. The page descriptions are added to the site, as is the privsite acy policy. Contact details are added, with the exception of the contact form, which should be added tomorrow, whereby, the link-optimise.com will be officially launched..
20/07/09 – More meta data is added to the site, as is a basic format for the contact form. This is tested and is shown to work. Just needs a little tweaking to perfect. The title tags for this page are added.
21/07/09 – The sitemap is submitted to Google for indexing. This is essential as not only will Google be aware of the site, but we can now use analysis tools to see how the site is performing. This will include what keywords are producing positive results for the site. It will take a few days for Google to kick into gear and index link-optimise.com, but all good things come to those that wait…
21/07/09 – The Great SEO Experiment has begun…
22/07/09 – The site has taken six hits in since the twitter advertising campaign began, one of which is from Ireland. If we rule out the other five as being something to do with us, that means that the site has already gained a visitor, despite not really being up there on the rankings just yet. Great stuff!
22/07/09 – A new news post is added to the site. The Great SEO Experiment is updated.
23/07/09 – The site has so far had 14 visitors in three days. As we are not quite there with keyword searches on “SEO”, or “search engine optimisation”. This is a testament to Twitter advertising, which is currently the only form of direct marketing we do. Interestingly, under the keyword of “The great SEO experiment”, we have received eight hits. This proves we have something to offer the SEO world.
24/07/09 – Goals are set on the analytics tools. This means we can track what pages are being looked at by users. The news section of the site is updated.
25/07/09 – The site received five extra visitors last night, this is most pleasing.
25/07/09 – After searching for “The Great SEO Experiment”, under Google UK pages, we’re on the first page, fourth on the list to be precise. The same search on the web shows us on page two. We’re coming, we’re coming…
26/07/09 – The site has so far received visitors from five different countries: UK, USA, Holland, Ireland, and Belgium. How about that.
27/07/09 – New changes to the site are discussed. These include RSS feeds for this page and our SEO news page. Posting of all news items on the home page, and a slight tweak to the our SEO contacts page. All good suggestions, we may follow one or all of these through over the next few days.
27/07/09 – SEO news blog updated.
28/07/09 – More visitors are attracted to the site, and a Google Analytics overlay shows this page is the most popular on the site. The services page and the contact page are also proving to be popular.
29/07/09 – SEO news website is updated with a post about blogging. This is an essential element to search engine optimisation and can not be overstated. Some site erros have been identified and will be corrected shortly. This page is updated.
30/07/09 – A Google search for “The Great SEO Experiment”, using pages from the web shows us ranked at number four. We have moved up from page 2 to page 1 in a matter of days.
30/07/09 – Disaster! This page wont display and careful examination of Wordpress has not shown us the reason why. If you are a regular follower of the experiment, then you have probably noticed this.
31/07/09 – The Experiment page is up and running after doing something really simple! And quite frankly, embarrassing! This is offset by the fact that if you search for “The Great SEO Experiment” on Google, we’re number one. This is after a week! Let us do this for your website. Contact us, we’re that good!
02/08/09 – The site continues to attract a steady stream of visitors, some are new and some are old. This is a good sign as it means we are always under consideration for the business. This page is still the most popular page on the site. New news posts are added to the site. The next phase of pushing link-optimise.com, will begin next week, as will new copy and modifications for the home page.
04/08/09 – The last few days the site has been pushed via digg as well as twitter. This has seen some positive results as people have dugg our Great SEO Experiment. This is still the most popular search term for finding our site on search engines. New news posts are added, and a glance at Google Analytics shows that we are on average attracting at least one new visitor a day, as well having some old friends come back. As one of our computers have gone down we can not implement any changes that we discussed last week yet. For now though the future of the company is looking good.
05/08/09 – We have learnt a lot about SEO in the two weeks that the site has been up and running. Primarily, we have learnt that content has to be optimised through keywords, meta tags, link and title tags, and that the site has to be updated daily. These elements seem to be key to make waves on Google. This will fuel the changes that happen to the site next week.
06/08/09 – The Great SEO Experiment though a popular and successful endeavour, has been a little directionless. We have had a ‘let’s see what happens if we do this’ attitude. As soon as the site is modified, and changes have been made, we will gear the site to appear for specific keywords, which we will reveal once the changes have been made. We’re all very excited here at link-optimise.com. If you’re seen, you’re sold.
07/08/09 – A new news post has been added. If you have not read any of our news posts, give them a read. They cover all aspects of SEO, and are very informative about explaining what different SEO services offer. If you are wondering what SEO is all about, or what you feel you many need from an SEO services company, these news posts should shed some light on the whole SEO concept. If you’re seen, you’re sold.
12/08/09 – Apologies for the lack of updates. One of our computers is still down so we have not implemented planned changes to the site. This setback is unfortunate. We hope it will be fixed soon. A new news item has just appeared. Check it out
16/08/09 – IT equipment is rebuilt, which means we can get cracking again with our SEO projects and SEO experiment.
19/08/09 – Meeting is held about direction of the site and improvements needed. The three keywords that the site is going to be geared around are “SEO”, “SEO services”, and “Search engine optimisation.” Though we have chosen three keywords, you may require more than that. Our SEO services will incorporate up to ten keywords into any SEO web design.
25/08/09 - The first site improvement is completed to the homepage, and a few more should be done soon. We also have a potential customer, so we will be putting a quote together in the next few days. A new news post has been posted.
26/08/09 – The contact page has been improved with better copy, slightly better design, and more optimisation of the page itself.
27/08/09 – A new SEO news post has appeared.
27/08/09 - Link-optimise submits its first quotation to search engine optimise a website. The SEO services are very descriptive, and is very reasonably priced. The copy rewriting should be completed on the website soon. An SEO news post has appeared.
31/08/09 – After much discussion, we have decided to utilise a link campaign to boost our rankings on Google. Though we do not currently rank anywhere under our decreed search terms, we do still attract visitors as we pull through on other aspects of search engine optimisation. Also, our twitter campaigns and other profile raisers are paying dividends too. It seems that successful SEO is not based on one thing, but several elements that come together like a pie! Not that I ate them all. Today, we have posted a new news post on the very subject, and we have also generated our own twitter account www.twitter.com/Linkoptimise, and this is linked to our facebook page. We have also joined the visa business network too. So let the link campaign begin, and we will see what happens. We’ll keep you posted every step of the way.
01/09/09 – We have seen good traffic to the site over the last few days, and that is before our Adwords campaign takes effect. We feel this shows that the new marketing and the new site are coming together. Though we are not ranking well on our chosen keywords, we continue to get in through other means. The SEO world is a curious one, that’s for sure.
05/09/09 – Advertising is something we are dabbling in at the moment. We currently have two ad campaigns running, one with Google, the other with Facebook. The facebook one has yielded over 130 hits to the site, where as the Google one has yielded six. These results have surprised me, but I guess they are all down to the visibility of the add. On Google, our add is not always instantly visible unless you click it. This is having a big impact on the campaign. We’ll keep you posted as to the ads progress.
06/09/09 – The Facebook ad has finished, and it yielded a 179 clicks to our site in three days. This has increased our traffic by 300%! If we were going to recommend a site to advertise on, it would have to be Facebook. This has the knock on effect that the profile of link-optimise, is being raised via the ad campaign.
06/09/09 – We have signed Link-optimsie up to eight directories, four of which were recommended for SEO. The details of where the recommendations came from will be shown on our new resources page. Do not forget to subscribe to our RSS feed for this and our SEO news pages.
17/09/09 – It’s been a while since we posted, so let us update you. The link campaign has grown and is we feel, taking effect. A Google search for the following keyword “need seo services”, sees us come in at number 2. This is a result of anchor text in the content, and the link campaign. The value of anchor text and how you associate it, is very important to SEO. We are going to try and explain it soon on our SEO Resources Page. The page was launched last week and is proving a very popular addition to the site, in fact it is vying for the most popular page along side this one.
The other option we are considering is outsourcing the link campaign. Not only will this speed up the campaign, but it will allow us to gauge the effect and the potential for offering the service to clients. So far we have dabbled in directories and press releases. This is all exciting and is paying dividends.
24/09/09 – Well it has been an exciting week. We have been on the front of Google for three different keyword phrases for one day. This particular day coincided with a press release, which could account for the temporary nature of the keyword success, but also some prominent links to the site went live. Of course, our success could be accounted for by other sites undergoing routine maintenance, and there is a possibility that the algorithm Google uses was changed slightly. There is a raft of reasons that explains the keyword success. We will endeavour to find out why.
We have also discovered that placing a link in the form of a relevant forum post, attracts traffic to your site. People seem naturally curious, so consider this if you’re planning to SEO a website.
30/09/09 – The experiment rolls on and new findings are cropping up all the time. Some of these question the thinking behind many SEO concepts, one of which is back links. Link-optimise, according to Webmaster Tools has 25 external links pointing at our site. Most of these are from my blog: www.teahon.co.uk and therefore, I would not have thought we should rate as high as we do for some searches. For example, we’re number one on the page for “The Great SEO Experiment”. We also rate highly for “SEO services links”. This throws the link idea not up in the air, but at least off the plate. Perhaps the best way to get popularity on Google is to ignore it completely, and just write quality content that is updated a lot. This way you become established.
We have recently paid for my site, www.teahon.co.uk, to be placed on a 100 directories to conduct a side SEO experiment. Under a search for freelance writer, the site has moved from page 31, to 30. Not exactly setting the world on fire with that one, yet it has 97 extra links pointing at it.
The point I am trying to make here is that yes, linking is important, and it is important to have good quality links to your site, but don’t feel that is the be all and end all of search engine optimisation. Make sure your fundamentals are in place, and then just keep producing good content for it. This will yield its own results.
05/10/09 – The Great SEO Experiment is a little directionless of late, so to remedy this, we have decided to raise our profile and hopefully our PR through signing up with social networks. Currently we are on the following networks:
My space
Delicious
The Visa Business Network
Digg
The aim is to sign up for two a night. The results will follow for the following keyword phrase: seo services links. Currently we rank around page 4 or 5 depending on what browser you are using.
06/10/09 – Our side project of www.teahon.co.uk is beginning to yield results. The site has moved from page 31 on Google(pages from the UK), to page 22. This is down to one or all of three things
-There has been a lot of activity on the site
-The link campaign
-Webmaster Tools successfuly downloaded a sitemap.
-Platinum SEO plugin
The fist and third, and last item speaks for themselves, the second is the intreiguing one as they do not show up on Webmaster Tools, even though Analytics shows hits from one site in particular, and that is www.wahweb.com We are going to try a new link-campaign for Teahon soon, and monitor closely.
Link-optimise was added to Plaxo, and Technorati. Plaxo was particularly impressive with its presentation.
08/10/09 – The site has been added to the following social networks. Google profile(for me under Teahon), Youtube, Friendfeed, Googlereader, blogger, lastfm, and Flickr. We have been steadily working our way through the sites that are listed as the most popular on Dandyid. This seemed a sensible place to start.
We have also increased from 25 links to 30 from the site. The extra links however, have not come from any of the afore mentioned social networks. The extra links have come from forums that we have posted on throughout September, and it would appear Webmaster Tools works around two weeks behind the actual date you linked to your site. Another intesting point is that our Anchor Text has risen from 6 phrases to 14 as many of our news posts are being pulled through. This can only be a good thing to attract traffic, and a few titles have been written with that purpose in mind.
12/10/09 – We have added Link-optimise, to tumblr, and Brightkite. The last one is particularly interesting site for sharing ideas.