Would you feel comfortable providing this website your credit card information? A small dip in search traffic is no immediate cause for concern (it may just be a temporary drop in consumer interest); but if that dip lasts for more than a few weeks or turns into a more significant …

Search engine algorithms assess the relevance of your page to any particular keyword by the content on your pages. When you use great tools like Google Analytics, you can be sure that you're writing content that you know your audience will want to read. Google is getting smarter and smarter …

A superior strategy over trickery is to put the time in, study, experiment, and always measure everything. Although we're nowhere near that point yet, the question has been raised as to whether Google's increased focus on mobile-friendliness, which often involves providing answers to simple questions within the browser itself, will …

Make the content flow easily to keep people intrigued and reading. If the competition in your niche is high, you'll have a hard time ranking on competitive head terms. If you have little competition, you'll even be able to rank for head terms. It sounds so very easy! GRPs provide …

Dedicated servers come preconfigured with all sorts of features on Linux or Windows. If you fail to understand your customers' search behaviour, you are missing one of the most important parts of your audience. In order to please both the search engines (who will reward you with high rankings over …

Product descriptions are important to both a customer-centric design and to search engines. In this case, having 5 pages about that lollipop is actually weaker than having just one with a decent amount of content. This will not only improve your ranking, but will make your site much more valuable …

Search engines provide the modern information scientist with a hugely rich data set of search terms commonly used by people to retrieve the web pages they are looking for. People check in, tweet, and update their status at any time and anywhere. Depending on the situation, SEO may involve both …

Any rapid increase in traffic suggests suspicious or 'black-hat' methods, which can only serve to damage your business in the long-term. If you've been producing content in a haphazard manner, hoping and praying that some of it eventually ranks, it's time to buckle down and commit to a more methodical …

Don't commit the cardinal sin of letting dots ruin your page descriptions You don't have to interrupt their favorite TV show, you don't have to take up space on a page where they are reading a news article. In order to index your website properly and include all of your …

People want to be able to find answers to their questions as fast as possible - studies show that people really care about the speed of a page. Humor has proven to be one of the best techniques for cutting through clutter, by getting attention and maintaining it. When you or …

Google's Penguin algorithm is designed to combat spam links. So, first of all, as Marie Haynes tells us, if you're sure you weren't involved in unnatural link building, most probably Penguin is not your problem. In particular, mobile applications should be mentioned here. All internal links on your website should …

A current situational analysis involves examination of the firm's ongoing market situation. Include text links. I highly recommend starting off with building out resources their target audience would care about, want to share on social media, and want to link to. In general, rational appeals succeed when potential customers have …

Find potential websites to acquire links from. To do this, we want to go to our trusty Google search and conduct a few searches. These searches use a hidden feature of Google called "Search Operators." The search operators can be used to drill down on concepts with Google and provide …

In essence, consumers tend to prefer brands sold by socially responsible companies. Your website is only as strong as your weakest link, so, the more pages you have "that are indexed and aging" and "linked appropriately or exclusively with the anchor text that page is intended to rank for" the …

This includes ranking and appearing well for search terms and variations that are used by your target audience in natural or organic search listings. The search engine views your site as more trustworthy. When you are implementing URL parameters, always check whether the ultimate copy changes significantly. You should particularly …

Google automatically detects which pages answer the users' query automatically and then display the top result as a featured snippet at the top of the page. This is Google's way of trying to help users to quickly find what they want by providing them with a snippet of information directly …

Yahoo! Dealing with a Google algorithm change like the page layout update can feel like falling into an abyss of constant web design changes over and over again. The placement of the ad on a search page depends on the price the company pays and the algorithm a search engine …

It's usually a blend of search engine hosted tools, third-party testing tools, and automation tools. Search engine optimization is perhaps one of the greatest marketing tools to come about online, but without proper article submissions it won't work out to your liking. That is why it's imperative to search and …

In the early days of the Internet, domain name selection was fairly easy. In the early days of the Internet, people participated in traffic exchange programs. You joined a network of websites that opened pop-under windows that contained a link to your website. Your website would get thousands of visitors …

Correct optimisation of the page also needs to be done for the search engine to understand the page content. A blog is one of the easiest ways to create a regular stream of SEO content. In general, blog posts are more engaging and more likely to attract links than product …

Standardization, in which a company features a uniform product and message across countries, is one option. A meta description is a short paragraph which is displayed under a title tag on the SERP (see screen above). A meta-description gives you the opportunity to introduce your brand before a searcher pays …

Search engines can also look at the search history for a given user. Basically, the search engine maintains a log of all the searches you have performed when you are logged in. You want to be successful online? Keyword research is the root of every optimization project. Keywords are like …

Evergreen content is content that has long-term value. Like an evergreen tree that always has leaves, evergreen content always has a use. Many types of e-commerce businesses exist, ranging from click-only operations that vend entirely online to bricks-and-clicks that supplement physical store operations with an online presence. As search engine …

Gross rating points (GRPs) measure the impact or intensity of an SEO plan. Whilst Search Engine Optimisation is indeed a powerful form of digital marketing, there are other types of marketing which can be advantageous to use alongside SEO marketing. For example, PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising and social media …

The implementation phase can vary drastically in size and complexity depending on the project. To be a part of the party, make sure your business website uses structured data markup. The continual growth of social media presents opportunities and challenges to marketing departments from the smallest single family business to …

If nobody has heard of your brand or company name (and it's not part of the important keyword phrases) put it at the end of the title tag. Monitor your KPIs to make sure the new website is performing well. A tool that is useful for keeping track of your …

Find answers to all of your questions early. Mobile is becoming more popular every year. Many small-business owners often struggle with the concept of the Internet, web design, and SEO. Breadcrumbs are used to tell users where they are within a site.

Make sure your SEO checklist includes web portals …

Does your keyword research still boil down to digging AdWords Keyword Planner for niche keywords, search volume and competition? When people hear about how great you are, they head to Google to discover more. You notice a spike in organic traffic from a foreign market that piques your interest. Growth …

Try to include short paragraphs of descriptive text for each link, which of course should contain your keywords. Google knows that if a page takes too long to load, visitors are likely to click away or go back. Now, Google tends to place other factors above site speed, but while …

Backlinks from relevant sites in your niche are also worth significantly more than irrelevant sites or pages The appearance of search engine results pages is constantly in flux due to changes in the algorithm. Google's home page has not changed much over the years. When you enter a description for …

Google Search Console Help Center has a set of instructions that you can follow on how to build and submit a sitemap. If you have a WordPress site, though, you can sit back and relax as a sitemap is already automatically generated and submitted to search engines for you. The …

Media service companies negotiate and purchase media packages (called media buys) for companies. Words that are normally written with uppercase letters should be written in lowercase and you should use hyphens over trying to separate words with capitals. The Google algorithm incorporates hundreds, if not thousands, of signals when determining …

If you find that content was stolen maliciously, and the webmaster refuses to believe your content is the original, then turn to Google's Online Copyright Infringement form. You can report scraped content to make sure Google acknowledges you as the true publisher and doesn't hurt your SEO through a duplicate …

Google, the top search engine--and the one to optimize for--handles more than 50 percent of search traffic and utilizes more than 100 algorithms to track and manage HTML content (on-page factors), external profiles (off-page factors), link architectures, popularity and reputation, as well as PageRank calculation (a complex site voting system …

Avoid exact match domains. For small local businesses, Twitter delivers an innovative marketing outlet. Message arguments, product information, and benefits should be placed in the copy. Away from on-page SEO, link-building is a huge factor in how search engines rank your web pages.

Find a simple guide to hits and …

The trends will start to appear! Behavioural targetting identifies keywords typed into search engines and the content read based on keyword searches. When website copy contains a wider variety of terms and keywords all relative to the same topic, it appears more natural, resulting in higher rankings. The content flows …

The algorithm responsible for taking the world's information and organizing it into (usually) 10 entries is, as you likely know, complicated. A customer relating a positive experience with a brand offers a testimonial. The hierarchy of effects model features similarities with theories regarding attitudes and attitudinal change, including the concepts …

Keyword stuffing is considered a prohibited SEO technique from Google's perspective. Even newer kids on the block like Snapchat provide a super fun way to consume news. Additionally, I'll show you where on your web pages to place your keywords and in what format to use. What are your general …

If you're like most website owners, at one time or another, you've asked if your website really needs SEO. It's a fair question, but one I can quickly dismiss. Many providers are available, including Theplanet.com, Rackspace.com, and Hostway.com. Search engines customize results based on individual searcher behavior …

Google Analytics provides a tool that shows the visible content of a web page in different browsers and screen resolutions. The concept of keyword density isn't talked about much anymore but is important to understand. SEO works by a search engine, such as Google, sending out software called 'bots' that …