Which part of search engine optimization (SEO) is most important? Well, it likely depends on who you ask, but just to be clear, all aspects are important. But which aspect of SEO you emphasize at any given time might be different based on what your website needs to succeed.

Before I go on, let me identify the different aspects of optimization that you should keep in mind:

1. On-site keyword management
2. Internal link structure
3. Website template and design
4. Inbound link building
5. Miscellanous issues

This is a little bit different kind of list than what you are typically used to seeing when this topic is discussed among industry professionals, but the fundamentals are there. On-site keyword management is necessary for high rankings. That doesn’t mean spamming the search engines by repeating your keywords over and over again. It does mean optimizing your web pages for keywords using density, tags, and other elements that assist web pages with ranking based on keyword usage (alt tags, page titles, heads and subheads, etc.).

Internal link structure refers to site navigation, but it also includes in-text links that may not be included in your navigation menu.

Design concerns are also important. Which codes do you use? How much of the code is on your page versus in a separate folder on the server? These are very important concerns to look at from a design and optimization perspective.

And link building. Much is said of link building. Often too much. But it is necessary for helping you get your pages ranked and moving up in the search rankings.

Which of these is most important? I still think on-site keyword management is the most important aspect of SEO. At certain times you may put more emphasis on internal link structure, inbound links, or design, but on-site keyword management will always be necessary. Without it, it won’t matter how well you do everything else, your SEO will be sub-par.

You Know It’s Time To Fire Your SEO Consultant When…

1. They tell you article marketing isn’t effective.
2. Your PageRank declines from a 7 or higher to a 3 or lower in the space of one week.
3. You suddenly realize your blog hasn’t been posted to in weeks.
4. They recommend that you re-do your entire website every time they hear that Google has changed its algorithm.
5. You find an office memo made out to Donald Duck from Mickey Mouse asking about the “Goofy” anchor text.
6. A message on your phone asks sincerely, “Do you want meta tags on every page?”
7. The template you paid $400 for isn’t getting crawled.
8. You have a Flash intro and the SEO wants to know, “How long do you want it to run?”
9. None of your photos have alt tags.
10. Your SEO comes to you for advice.
11. They ask you which search engine do you want your site submitted to.
12. Even worse, she asks how often you want your website submitted to the search engines.

But seriously, if your search engine optimization consultant doesn’t get you positive results within a reasonable amount of time and doesn’t seem to have expert knowledge in article marketing, blogging, meta tag management, content development, and link building then you’re with the wrong SEO. It’s time to replace Mickey Mouse with a real search engine optimization consultant.

Many new webmasters wonder why they don’t show up in search engine results right away. The reason is quite simple. No one trusts you yet.

Before you can build up trust within your target audience, you must first build trust with the search engines. How do you do that?

• Start with on-page optimization
• Build links gradually, not all at one time
• Seek constant improvement
• Don’t buy or sell PageRank
• Offer a positive user experience
• Don’t just focus on SEO, work on building traffic through equitable and ethical relationships
• Be consistent
• Make sure the search engine know you are in it for the long term

Search engine optimization is a long-term strategy. There is no short-term get-it-there-quickly solution, nor should there be. Site age is important because if the search engines know that you are in the game long term then they know that you are committed to constant improvement and excellent user experiences. The search engines want their search queries to provide a useful and relevant experience to searchers. When that happens, websites that make it happen will be rewarded.

If the search engines believe that you have set up a site for short-term gains when the SEO game is a long-term playing field then they won’t treat you the same as they do a site that has been online for ten years and has built up authority. That’s what you want to be - an authority. Don’t take shortcuts, learn the rules of the playing field, and jump in the game long term. Otherwise, you’re not really serious about ranking well and web business. The search engines know it.

SEO, really good search engine optimization, is not easy. It takes time and patience. You have to do the proper amount of keyword research, narrow down the right keywords and determine which ones you want to target and then design and write the content for the landing pages. It isn’t easy.

Many companies try to do their own optimization work. If you are one of those companies and you are relying entirely upon your search engine marketing skills to get clients then you might be waiting a long time. That’s because ranking each page of your website well in the major search engines is a long-term strategy. It isn’t like you can put a website today and rank well for all your key terms next week. It might be a year or two before you capture the key phrase you are looking for and it largely depends on your industry and the competition.

Why am I telling you all this? Because while SEO may be difficult to perform, it is necessary. And if you do it your self then you are putting your business at risk. How many hours will you spend trying to optimize your website for your keywords only to see that it will take a year or two before you see any results? Go into it with realistic expectations and please think long term.

Did you know Google has an search engine optimization (SEO) “best practices” guide for webmasters? And they’ve put it into a neat little .pdf file that you can download yourself. What the best practices? There are 13 of them. The list:

• Create Unique, Accurate Page Titles
• Make use of the “description” meta tag
• Improve the structure of your URLs
• Make your site easier to navigate
• Offer quality content and services
• Write better anchor text
• Use heading tags appropriately
• Optimize your use of images
• Make effective use of robots.txt
• Be aware of rel=”nofollow” for links
• Promote your website in the right ways
• Make use of free webmaster tools
• Take advantage of web analytics services

To download the free SEO guide from Google, click here.

Search engine optimization is not intuitive. It’s a learned skill. But it can be confusing for someone who has never encountered it from the backside of a website. The language alone can scare some people: Keywords, link relevance, anchor text, meta tags, CSS, dynamic HTML, site architecture, and all the rest.

While there are a great many things to learn about SEO from a technical point of view, there are some bare essentials that everyone should know. If you own a website of any kind or do any kind of business online - whether you build your own websites or have someone else develop them - then you should be aware of the basic elements of SEO. But what are those?

There are four key areas of search engine optimization where website development is concerned and you should have a basic understanding of at least three of these four:

• Keyword-focused content - Keyword-rich content is still the meat of most websites today. You should understand how keywords fit into the overall design and development of a website, what they can and should be used for, and the dangers of going too far.
• Link building - Links are important on the web. Outbound links, inbound links, and internal site links are very important. You should have a basic familiarity with the types of links and how to employ them for maximum benefit.
• Website design - Not all website designs are equal. There are some elements that are better for optimization of your website than others. You don’t have to know it all, but you should be familiar with design elements that don’t provide the best benefits, and avoid them.
• Code - You can’t build a website without code. You don’t have to be a coder to understand that every kind of code has its purpose and to go beyond the means of that purpose could hurt you.

Every website owner, even if you don’t do your own coding or website design, should be familiar with the basic elements of SEO.

A caller wanted to know how he could push down a Ripoff Report listing in the search engine rankings for his company name. I don’t know if he knew that report also ranked for his personal name. He never mentioned it.

In fact, Google his personal name and all you’d see is the Ripoff Report review of his employee management skills. “Can I have that pushed down in the rankings?” he asked.

The answer also Yes, of course. How much money do you want to spend and how long do you want to take? Those are the most logical questions. There is more to think about than just pushing down a negative comment. In order to do that you have to “push up” something else. A quick survey of the situation revealed the following about his website:

• He needed meta tags on every page
• Several internal pages had no content, only photos (without alt tags)
• Inbound links were limited
• He had no blog
• Multiple CSS files (unnecessary ones at that) were slowing down his load time, which affects your Google quality score and search rankings

In a word, this gentleman needed help, and fast. Here’s what we recommended:

• Add meta tags to every page
• Add 50-60 word descriptions for all his photos, make them thumbnails that open in a larger window with a click, and give them alt tags
• Do some link building
• Add a blog to the site and write to it every day
• Do some code cleanup and consolidate the CSS files

When it comes to reputation management for small businesses in a small town, the best place to start is with SEOing your own website. Make sure your website is the absolute best that it can be then guage the situation to see what happens after you’ve made the changes. Target the right keywords and you can push down those negative reputation killers. But it takes time, sometimes takes a lot of money, and always takes a lot of patience. How much do you really it want done?

Semantic search is the ability of the search engines to know intuitively what your website is about by analyzing the content without focusing on specific keywords. Traditional search engine optimization involves optimizing a web page according to a keyword or keyword phrase, which the webmaster adds to his web page a certain number of times to ensure that his site is ranked accordingly. With semantic search you can rank for a keyword phrase and not use it at all on your page.

That’s my understanding of semantic search. Keep in mind that I’m not an expert on algorithms. I have might have a few details wrong, but this is the gist of it.

Google is currently doing semantic search. You don’t necessarily have to use your keyword phrase in every paragraph to rank for it. But you should use similar terms and synonymous phrases so that Google knows what your web page is about generally. The search engine analyzes your overall content, links, photo alt tags, and other on-page and off-page elements to determine what your web pages are about then ranks them accordingly. In a sense, this is more intelligent content and doesn’t look contrived.

How often do you review your search engine optimization strategy? You should look at it at least every six months to be sure that you are using the proper strategies for your level of development. Websites in different levels of development require different strategies. Here are the three levels of development and what you should be focusing on during those stages:

• Content Development - The content development stage is the period in the beginning of your website development when you are building content. It involves doing keyword research, competitive research, narrowing your niche, building content, and starting your blog. During this stage the focus should be on creating awesome content.
• Link Building - The link building phase comes next. After you have had several of your most important pages indexed by the search engines, you should then embark upon your link building phase. This is where you aggressively pursue link relationships with other sites within your niche, perform article marketing, step up your blogging, get involved in directory submissions, blog commenting, and forum posting, and pursue as many inbound links as you can for your website.
• Refining Stage - During the refining stage of your website you are no longer building your reputation. You now have established yourself as a solid authority within your niche. You have several page 1 listings and may have a few No. 1 listings. Even if you have not achieve page 1 rankings you have a lot of traffic and other websites within your niche recognize you as an authority. Continue your link building, review your site design and fix any architectural issues you may have. Develop new content and think of ways to monetize your site and extend your reach.

Review your website every six months to see if you need to make any changes to your search engine optimization strategy. The length of time you spend in each stage above depends on each website, how aggressive you are in promoting it, and the level of competition. Never give up on strong search engine optimization strategies.

It’s amazing, but online marketers are still arguing about which is better - SEO or social media. I don’t know why it has to be either/or. Why can’t it be both?

Well, it should be. Marketers need to learn to make SEO and social media work together. They’re two different tools with two different purposes and learning how to make both work for you is key to being successful online.

SEO, or search engine optimization, is the practice of building a website that ranks in the search engines for keywords that you want to target. Social media is not SEO, but it can have SEO implications and knowing how to fit it into your overall marketing plan will serve you well. When you optimize for social media you are trying to build relationships based on trust with people you will likely never meet in life. Knowing what social media users want versus what search engines and searchers want is the first step to integrating the two strategies for maximum marketing mojo.

The next time you hear two online marketers arguing over whether SEO or social media is better, give a soft response: “I use both quite effectively.”

Now that the election is over, Search Engine Optimization Journal can congratulate Barack Obama on becoming the first black president in U.S. history. This is a landmark event. But how he got there is just as important and telling as being there. Here are a few tips that Obama’s political campaign can teach about search engine optimization:

• Don’t be too confident. Maintain some humility and bear in mind that no matter how good things look for you now, there is still work to do.
• Don’t put all your keywords in one basket. Barack Obama new that winning an election meant campaigning in a multi-tiered fashion. You can’t target just one demographic. You must appeal to every segment of your market in terms that they can understand.
• Start early. Barack Obama has been campaigning for two years. Online, age is a factor. Start early and stay on top.
• Newcomers can beat old veterans. First it was Hillary Clinton then it was John McCain. Just because the other guys have more experience doesn’t mean that the guy with new ideas can’t come out on top.
• Don’t spend all your time in areas you know you’re going to win. You must target the swing states - that is, there are segments of the marketplace that can go your way or move closer to your competition. Focus on those segments and make a strong case for yourself.
• Choose a team that makes up for your weaknesses. Obama picked Biden and that made a huge difference. What Obama lacked in experience his running mate made up. Pick your team in a similar manner and charge ahead.
• Stay positive. No matter what the enemy throws at you, keep it positive and stay focused. Have the audacity of hope.
• Change. Make sure that if you offer change that it is change we need.

Remember, search engine optimization is not a zero sum game. Like many losers of political elections, you can come back later and win. Barack Obama has lessons to teach us all - about SEO and about life.

Google Base is an often overlooked tool for webmasters and business owners. Even if you don’t have a website you can use Google Base to sell your products online. The types of products and services that you can promote through Google Base include:

• Events and Activities
• Housing
• Personals
• Hotels
• Jobs
• Products
• Recipes
• Vehicles
• Vacation rentals
• Services
• Reviews
• People profiles

That’s quite a list. And it’s pretty simple to up on Google Base and list your items. Plus, there is no limit to the number of items you can promote. You can actually list your entire inventory. Here’s what you do:

• Sign into your Google Account
• Click on “one at a time” if you have a few items or “data feed” if you have a lot of items

For the rest of the process I’m going to assume you only have a few items to promote and clicked on “one at a time.”

• Choose an existing type of item or create your own
• Complete the form for the type of item you are creating
• In your description, be sure to give as much detail as possible and write your description with search engine optimization in mind; that is, use keywords and link to a page on your website where people can get more information about what you are offering. Use anchor text.

That’s it. Pretty simple.

Are social media sites like Twitter and Facebook killing SEO? Wired Magazine published an article telling would-be bloggers not to start their blog and go to social media sites instead. But is that good advice?

Wired does make a good point. Blogging is getting harder to do - the right way. It is more challenging and there is more competition. It still provides good search engine optimization and it still can drive targeted traffic to a static website.

For the most part, Wired Magazine was talking to personal bloggers, not commercial bloggers. Commercial blogging is just getting its start. And there is practically no better way to build inbound links for your commercial website than through an offsite blog on the same, or similar, topic. As a commercial website, you’re not going to get other sites related to your niche to link to you because they are likely competition. Your best bet is to approach third-party sites like online trade journals and news sites to link to you, but many of them will only link to their sponsors. How do you get free links? Blogging is the best way to build a portfolio of free, quick inbound links.

Now that Halloween is over, you can start preparing your SEO team for Thanksgiving and Christmas, the busiest time of year for most retailers. Though, admittedly, the two holidays may be suitable for two different types of merchants.

If you do a lot of business around Thanksgiving and sell products related to the Thanksgiving holiday then you are almost too late, but not quite. Now is the time to start preparing and selling for the turkey-related holiday. That means ham, yam, and cranberry sauce vendors can have an SEO good time.

But even if you’re not in the food business you can capitalize on Thansksgiving by offering your holiday specials and making it easy for your customers to shop on your site. Make sure you optimize your landing pages for the right keywords. You can optimize for ‘Thanksgiving’ as well as your niche-related keywords to pull in the holiday shoppers. At any rate, you are competing against some stiff competition so get started now to beat the Thanksgiving holiday rush.

Google can now indexed scanned documents - .pdf files and other images of print text. Wow!

This is great news because before humans - people like you me - had no problems reading scanned documents online, but the search engines did. Now you can scan your entire library of technical manuals and possibly rank for search terms within them. At least, in theory.

From Google’s official blog:

Consider a circle. Should it be read it as a zero, the letter ‘O’, just a circle, or the ring from my coffee cup? People learn to answer this kind of question very quickly, but for the computer it is a painstaking and error-prone process.

Check it out:

Here’s a link to the SERP.

Now view the .pdf document.

Incredible that the huge title across the top of the page on the .pdf file is the actual title of the document in the SERP, just like on a web page. How you can make that work for your website? Any ideas?