Important On-page Factors To Judge When Building Links

Here are seven on-page factors to judge when building links.

1. Types and Quality of Content

Building links can be hard when you have great content. When you have subpar content? It can be a nightmare, unless you're willing to use riskier strategy.

One big problem that I see with the general blanket advice of "create great content" is that there isn't always a essential emphasis on creating the right kind of content. Not all site needs a blog.

Think about what your users want to see, what they need, what they'd find useful and helpful, and see if you can make it in such a way that people outside of your target audience could also advantage..

Good writing is also very important. If there's one thing that makes me instantly distrust or discount a site, it's poor writing.

2. Titles

Misleading titles waste people's time.

Think about how you'd sense if you were running Google AdWords and the person who had written your ads had used a title that caused loads of people to click then instantly leave the site because they were misled. There's absolutely a chance that you might come up with a great title that you think completely represents your content but no one else agrees.

3. Images
 

For my monthly columns, we're required to use images, and rightly so as there's a lot of information out there about the increased user engagement on content that is or contains at least one chart.
Images by themselves can be fantastic for link building purposes, but if it's true that having a post with an image on it can up the chances of attracting more eyes on your content, that noticeably increases your chances of getting links.

4. Video and Interactive Content 

Above all else, make sure that your video or interactive content really works! I seem to have a bad habit of landing on posts that contain videos that don't load. If you're pulling something like this from another site, make sure it's dependable.

5. Internal Links and Search ability
 

Think of this from a user's perspective. If you land on the homepage of a site that you found in the SERPs or saw socialized on Twitter, it may not hold the information that you're looking for and hoping to potentially link to. If it's difficult to move around on the site and find what you need, you'll get frustrated.

Don't make things hard for people. If you have a Services page but have a page for each of those services that goes more in-depth, then link to it! It sounds clear, but I've seen enough pages where basics like this weren't done that I don't think anything can really be too obvious a concept.
 

6. Outbound Links

When you link out, do so to trusted and applicable sites. Think of it in the same way that you would think about a site linking to you. You want those links to be good ones, so link out well.
I've thought less of several articles when I saw who they referenced. If someone writes an article that is widely criticized, one where the comments are full of authority figures pointing out the inaccuracies, then I will think less of a post that links to that article in order to highlight it as a reputable one. You are who you associate with, remember.

7. Shareability and User Engagement

Remember how we had planning online before Twitter? We commented on posts.
Many times discussions seem to take place on social media and not in blog comments, so I wouldn't discount content that has no comments, but if a post has 150 spam comments on it, I would think twice before linking to it. If I come diagonally a post from someone I've never heard of and see people that I know commenting on it or sharing it online, I'm much more likely to spend the time to read it myself.
 

Conclusion

Make your content something that we want to link to, something that's simply shared on Twitter or Facebook or wherever you want it to be shared. Make your site easily searchable and make sure everything works and looks good, too, and check it on mobile devices. It's fairly simple.
With the nonstop information being published online, people have to pick and prefer what they read, share, and link to, so don't think that on-page factors don't come into play where links are worried. They can make or break your link building in many cases.

You might also like: Link Building Things To Be appreciative For 2013

Make a Better connection between the Clients and SEO Provider

 Here are 15 pieces of advice that will help you build a better relationship with your SEO provider.

1. Be sincere About What You've Done in the Past

 This is maybe the most critical piece of advice. Lots of clients have done some shady things that they might not have fully hidden were being done, and many have known exactly what was being done and just chose to ignore the repercussions.

Be honest about what was done. It's rare to find someone who hasn't done some sketchy marketing at some point. We're not judging.

Good clients will explain what they have done so their source can find out how to fix it or counteract it faster, if needed.

2. Don't Immediately Blame Links When Something Goes Wrong

Don't instantly blame links if your SEO service provider has built one for you and you've just messed up your robots.txt file. Also, if your SEO provider has built some great links and your site skyrockets to the top of the rankings, generating lots of new traffic and conversions, don't try and insist that it had nothing to do with their work.

3. No shock URL Changes

Don't change URLs without 301ing them or telling your SEO provider about it. If you've provided some targets to work with and they are suddenly 404ing, that's awkward. Webmasters start to get cranky when you have to go back and ask for a change.

4. Share Access to Webmaster Tools and Analytics

If your SEO provider can't see what's happen, it's much harder to do a good job. Sure, we can bug you for this info, but it's much easier if we can dig in and not have to wait for you to come back from your weeklong holiday so we can get the data we need.

5. Answer Questions

I can promise you that I have never once asked a client a question just because I was being nosey. If I ask whether you've just changed 100 URLs, to go back to harping on that one, it's because it affects my work.

If I do have access to your analytics and ask if you've done anything on-site that could account for the sudden fall in traffic to a specific page, again, it's not just because I have nothing better to do than ask unrelated questions.

6. Listen to Our Advice on Risk

Not to be humorous here, but if someone who doesn't mind buying links tells you that your link buying plan is just too risky, you really, really should listen. If we stand to make more money off building more links for you but we say we shouldn't do it, it's because we really believe that you're playing with fire.

7. Don't Employ Multiple Teams or People to do the Exact Same Thing

If you do this and both (or all 10) of us wind up getting relations on the same site, don't complain about it and try and make some of us go back to the webmaster and get them detached.
8. Don't Share Someone Else's secret Information

If you send your provider something that is clearly marked as being "for your eyes only", all your provider will think is that one day you'll be sending their confidential information to someone else.

9. Be obvious About What You Want

Don't start out asking for one service and then run your provider all around until you at last admit that what you really want is something totally different.
I've written up loads of consulting proposals for clients who asked for one specific service. Then, after spending loads of time on it, the clients admitted that they really just wanted me to go buy a bunch of links for them. If you want paid links, then say so.

10. Ask Why a Service Costs What it Does

We'd rather explain pricing to you now than receive a complaint about it later. The more you know about what we do, the better.

11. Don’t Ask About Price Matching

Don't give us pricing information that you've pulled off the site of some offshore SEO firm that no one's ever heard of and expect a provider to meet that price. If you do and your SEO provider says OK, be very nervous.

12. Be Fair About customer Examples

Don't freak out if your provider can't give you the example you want when you're trying to decide if they are the right fit. Sometimes there are iron-clad nondisclosure agreements in place.
However, please be friendly to ways that your provider can prove its worth without violating client confidentiality.

13. Any Good Link Builder Knows About More Than Just Building Links

If you're asked to support your new content socially to give it more attention, take that recommendation. Don't just think that because you can't immediately tie social to links, it means the advice is worthless.

If you're told to do a few things to speed up your homepage load time since it keeps timing out, listen. Link building is much easier when a site's worth linking to, you know.

14. Don't Focus on What Your Competitors Are Doing

Don't frequently point out what your competitor is doing that violates Google's guidelines and ask why we don't just imitate them.
For one thing, your site is not the same as their site. For another thing, if you build a profile based on someone else, you're contributing to a footprint, and that's not a good thing.
Would you want them copying you? No.

15. Don't Try to Get Something for Free

I doubt you'd be able to find a decent SEO who doesn't end up giving away way too much for free. Many of us are really nice people who are willing to share what we know and help people.
But there is a limit.

If you want to pay for an audit, then get a quote and pay for one. Don't try and weasel out pieces of an audit for free each month.

If you're paying for a service, stick to the scope of your contract. Asking a question here and there is OK, but if you want someone to spend 2 hours on the phone walking you through how to do something, expect to pay for that time.

Summary

It's critical that you're honest and willing to listen to your SEO provider.
You know how a lawyer wants to know the truth so they can best defend someone? While I understand that's a bit of an outlandish comparison, I'm still going to make it.

If you're paying us for our expertise, then accept that relationship and realize that most us do actually want to do a great job for you. The more we know, the better we can achieve.

You might also like : SEO For 2014

Matt Cutts On The variation Between “strong” and “b” Tags In Terms Of SEO

Matt Cutts, Google’s head of search spam, answers a query about text formatting in his newest video where a user writes in to ask:

“In terms of SEO, what is the difference between <strong> tag and <b> tag for emphasis on assured words of text. From the user perspective, both tags have the same result (words in bold). Which tags should we use in which conditions?”

This is a throwback question from 2006 when Matt assured us that, when it comes to SEO best practices, there is no difference between using <strong> or <b> tags. Both tags get treated the accurate same in terms of ranking and how pages are indexed.

In the video Matt Cutts recalled answering this question while addition that there is also no difference between <em> and <i> tags when it comes to ranking, scoring and other search factors.

Matt was somewhat vague in his response, saying things may have changed since 2006, “but I actually kind of doubt it.” You can use either one and Matt says there won’t be any difference when it comes to Google ranking.

Matt says that the only difference between the two tags is that that <strong> tag refers to presentation, while the <b> tag is a semantic label. But he reminds us that in practice they both do the same thing, every browser just uses the tags to make text bold.
Matt ends the video by cheering us not to worry about it. Go ahead and use whatever you prefer.

The fact regarding SEO and Call Tracking

There has been a vast deal of talk about SEO and call tracking lately. Several local marketers have written articles decrying call tracking, saying that it hurts SEO. Other local marketing experts have written rebuttals, stating obviously that call tracking does not hurt SEO when it is deployed correctly.

What is Call Tracking?

Call tracking is a way for online marketers to follow which sources, campaigns, and keywords generate phone calls. Hundreds of thousands of marketer’s crossways the U.S. and Canada use call tracking to close the loop on their marketing ROI calculations. Some of the biggest companies in the world use call tracking to calculate the effectiveness of their PPC campaigns, SEO pains, and retargeting. These companies value call data significantly. They spend a lot of money on it.

Marketing agencies also use call tracking. They use it as a way to show their worth to their clients. It is particularly popular among agencies that do PPC and SEO work.

What is the fact?

Call tracking, when used properly does not hurt SEO. That’s the truth. Even most eager call tracking opponents admit that.

The correct way to use call tracking is to use call tracking DNI. This doesn’t hurt SEO. We’ll discuss more about this afterward in the article.

The problem is that the call tracking industry has usually done a very poor job of educating marketers about what correct use of call tracking actually is.

Why Do Some Say Call Tracking Hurts SEO?

Because of NAP.

Google makes it very clear that Name Address and Phone number (NAP) have to be reliable across all online directories. Having unlike phone numbers in a ton of different places confuses Google’s algorithms and will hurt your SEO. This is why a few local marketers have written articles criticizing call tracking.

They’re right about one craze. Call tracking numbers should not be used in a range of directory listings across the web. That will hurt your SEO. This is common knowledge (or should be).

However, far too often articles offensive call tracking will lump all uses of call tracking (on-site Dynamic Number Insertion, primarily) together with erroneous use of call tracking in directories.

And, admittedly, some call tracking companies have not operated with care in this area. They have located call tracking numbers all over directories without worrying about the consequences for their clients. This is bad business and bad for the industry.

Ways to properly Use Call Tracking

One of the best articles regarding how to correctly use call tracking was written recently by the Minnesota Search Association. I STRONGLY recommend that you read this article. They lay out 5 exact ways to ensure that call tracking does not harm your SEO. At the risk of being recurring, I won’t go into the details and methods they discuss. But I will mention one more method that ensures call tracking is safe, Dynamic Number Insertion.

Both sides of the debate.

The bottom line is this: local marketers and call tracking companies need to deal with this nuanced issue in a nuanced way. If a call tracking business says that call tracking numbers NEVER hurt SEO, they are wrong. If a local marketer says that call tracking numbers ALWAYS or even MOSTLY hurt SEO, they are incorrect.

Using call tracking numbers on directories is bad. Using call tracking DNI on your site is good.

Three dreadful Things That People really Think Are True about SEO

It’s not easy being an SEO. There’s a ton of myth busting that has to happen in order to coax your clients to success. Whether you’re educating clients or trying enhancing your own site’s SEO, you need to be aware of several constant beliefs that can lead to SEO disaster. What follows are three SEO lies that people still think are true about SEO.


“I should optimize my fasten text.”

Even in the ravaged landscape of a post-Penguin 2.0 world, there are survivors who think that optimizing anchor text will boost them superior on the SERPs. While only just talking with an online business owner, I was confused at his insistence that optimized anchor text was the way to go. “It might work,” he argued, if he optimized every single anchor text both for both onsite and offsite SEO.

SEO best practices protector against optimized anchors. Instead, use anchors that hold sentence fragments, branded anchors, or even naked URLs. A site that contains optimized anchors is a site that is in risk of being penalized.

 “Throw enough mud on the wall; some of it will attach.”

Another common faith is that SEO is a haphazard free-for-all attempt to do anything and everything that might help. ”Let’s do SEO!” someone in upper management shouts. So, a team of lackeys scamper off to do social media, onsite optimization, directory register, Tumblr blogs, article submissions, viral videos, backlinks, blogging, and whatever else they can dream up.
The choice is to develop an SEO approach that provides real ROI and ensures that you will gain ranking. Such strategy involves three main areas.

1.    Onsite optimization. 

2.    Social signals. 

3.    Backlinks. 

 “We’ll get first-page rankings in a few weeks.”

“How long will it take?” I’ve heard this question a million times. And I get it. We all want to see skyrocketing rankings right away — a nice line graph that goes every advanced. We want first-page search results in record time. We want the first place on Google by the weekend or at least before the end of Q3. We all want results, and we want them yesterday.
Sadly, SEO doesn’t work that way.

This wait-a-long-time-for-results thing is a huge cause of caution with SEO. “SEO is not working” is code complaint for, “I don’t have the patience for SEO.”

Here’s the truth about SEO:  It’s a slow-and-steady-wins-the-race deal. I was on the phone with someone last week, and I used this very expression — “slow and steady wins the race” about SEO. The person retorted, “I disagree with you; as long as you’re doing it right, you’ll rank instantly.”

I’m sorry, but it doesn’t work that way. In spite of the rapidly varying nature of the industry, SEO requires a longview for longterm success.

So, let’s go back to that question — “how long will it take?” As you most likely anticipated, there is no easy answer, let alone a single answer.  The speed at which one attains SEO results depends on the excellence of the SEO, the health of the site, the DA level of the linkbacks, the quality of the link profile, the competition level of the niche, the status of current rankings, and about a million other factors.

For more visit : http://seonewsgoogle.blogspot.in/2013/08/what-is-new-definition-of-seo.html 

4 Reasons to expend More on SEO

Google has made dramatic changes in 2013, with the May 22 Penguin update having the biggest impact for small business websites. After some severe reductions in traffic, some webmasters are at least seeing traffic increases in August due, in part, to a Panda softening from Google.

In response, many webmasters are making big shifts in SEO plans. While long overdue, this is the right move.
Few businesses are looking to move to lower excellence SEO services as they now fear Google more than ever. But small businesses run very close to the margin and usually resist increasing the SEO budget, regardless of the consequences. Here are four reasons why small business owners should reconsider.

1. Google Asked You To

While many will dismiss this as PR, Google has clearly communicated that they no longer will tolerate SEO tactics that used to work in 2008. Article rotating, keyword stuffing, excessive bookmarks, reborn domains, paid links, thin content, and duplicate content are all not OK.
Even if you haven't established an unnatural link warning, the writing is on the wall. Quality must increase for continued achievement in SEO. While this message is clearly self-serving for Google, it's significant to respect their power in the industry.

2. Recovering From Google Updates is luxurious

There are plenty of websites that have partially recovered from Penguin downgrades, but each case is different. The level of frequent traffic varies.
Technical issues on-site are the easiest to fix and should be addressed speedily using Webmaster Tools as the guide. Duplicate content needs to be removed immediately.
Keyword-stuffed titles need to be edited. Thin content, a beloved among many, should be replaced with real content marketing.
Off-site issues, such as bad link building, are mostly hard to fix. It is very ironic that firms now exist to send "link removal request" emails to other firms who were previously retained to build those links.
Small business needs to stop doing bad link building and embrace content marketing. They need to get creative and research with newsjacking.

3. SEO Has combined With Marketing

Many small business webmasters were using a "set-it-and-forget-it" SEO plan, believing that they need not worry about SEO after hiring a firm. This violates one of the major tenets of business process outsourcing, which is to outsource process and execution, but maintain strict performance monitoring and accountability.
It isn't surprising that many small businesses are feeling buyer's remorse, wishing they had done greater due-diligence in the vendor range process and better understood the risks associated with SEO.
It should be clear at this point that SEO is no longer a technical exercise and is quickly merging with marketing and public relations. Smart CEOs recognize the strategic importance of SEO in our digital world. For this reason, they find ways to amplify SEO in all marketing activities. Ironically, many companies have SEO opportunities they don't harness.

For example, every employee should continue a "work" Twitter account and share industry news, blog posts and company specials to help spread content. This type of integrated SEO marketing implementation is the future, and will draw more budget dollars.

4. SEO ROI Remains High

 The data suggests that SEO is still a vast investment. This means that small business shouldn't essentially shop for the cheapest SEO vendor, but consider the return they can make on their money if they pay out more:
•    SEO remains a very high ROI activity.
•    The cost-per-lead for SEO is still very striking.
•    Google has significantly tightened the necessities for high-quality SEO.
 •    Integrated marketing strategies have big efficiencies.

Conclusions

All technologies and industries mature, and price-points typically change radically along the way. SEO is next the same playbook as most other young industries.
In the last few years we have seen SEO move from infancy to adolescence, with the Google algorithm updates as mileposts. While SEO will turn into more difficult and costly to execute, the return on investment remains high for small business. In the end, ROI is more significant than the absolute number of a budget line item.

For more visits: http://seonewsgoogle.blogspot.in/2013/08/what-is-SEO-optimization.html

Up coming Trends in the World of Search Engine Optimization

Things have been varying for quite some time in the SEO world. Hence, new trends have finally surfaced. Things that didn’t matter a few years ago are now of crucial importance and companies are constantly making use of them to get more traffic. Here are a few such emerging trends in the SEO world:

• Mobile Search

According to a study conducted by Google, the queries from smart phones and tablets worldwide enlarged 80% year over year in 2012. Keeping that in mind, it has now become really necessary for website owners to update their strategies to cope up with the high number of mobile searches being conducted every day. The only way to keep up with this trend is to prepare the websites for mobile searches and to contain the use of mobile specific web formatting.

 • Twitter

Twitter is a public networking website like many others but its biggest advantage is its use for link building. Businesses can easily tweet their message and website on twitter. It is an easy way to catch the attention of genuine potential customers as the people who click on your link will already be fascinated in you (because of your description in the tweet). Apart from that, you can make your tweets re-tweetable and ask people to re-tweet (RT) them. As soon as your followers retweet them, their followers will see it and they might click on your link and re-tweet your tweet as well. Another way that you can get people talking about your company on twitter is to add a “tweet this” icon on your website thus enabling visitors to share your page.

 • Quality

With its recent algorithm changes, Google has taken some major steps to make sure that the results provided to the users are of good value. Hence, all the websites that contain frequent, irrelevant material are now suffering. Your material needs to be new and useful. Due to these changes, businesses now have to make sure that they update their websites commonly in order to convince Google that their material consists of a backlog of accurate content and provides value to the users.

 • Google +

Google+ might not be such a trending social networking site, but it is one of the most important “emerging trends” in SEO. Since it’s a Google product, Google can very simply collect information about the interests and personal preferences of users depending on the websites that they visit while they are signed into their Google+ account. This gives a entire new meaning to modified search. Users can also claim their work by linking it to their Google+ profile. Apart from that, Google can easily access data from Google+ therefore; the results from Google+ control the results from all other social networking websites.

• Conversion Rate Optimization

Since everyone wants conversions and not just traffic, CRO has become a very trending topic in the SEO world recently. By optimizing a website such that it provides an overall improved yet effortless experience to the users, can greatly increase conversion rates. Due to the increased conversion rates of a website, search engines will be able to rank them better than the websites that only get search traffic.

• The Final Say

Trends have been constantly changing in the SEO world and therefore it is becoming very important for website owners to familiarize themselves with the most modern trends. Whether it is the new algorithm changes in Google or the different techniques used to get more traffic, businesses will have to cope up with the changes or risk getting left behind in this race.

How to Integrate SEO and Social Media

Companies have regarded search engine marketing and social media as two detach things, but now the lines are blurred. I like how Lee Odden puts it, “if social media and SEO fit together like peanut butter and jelly then content is the bread that holds them together.” 

How Social Media Affects SEO

SEO is about optimizing content to appear upper in search rankings. It could be on your website or on your blog, and in social media.

Social media principles are becoming more powerful as companies try to earn better search results. Search engines now use social values, or retweets, Facebook likes and shares, and Google+1s, to help decide organic search rankings.

The bottom line is mixing. When you mix SEO and social, you’ll improve your search engine relevancy.

How to mix SEO and Social

Integrating social and SEO “starts with a good content strategy, which coordinates your marketing and content hard work into one solid plan, and is supported by engaging your social media audiences rather than only approaching your content on them,” said Jayson Demers in a Huffington Post article.

Besides a content strategy, you also need an lively social media presence, links from your website to your social profiles and vice versa, and social share buttons on your website or blog so people can share your content effortlessly.

Here are some other tips:

    Look at what keywords drive traffic to your website so you can make content that targets them.  Use free tools from Google to do some basic keyword study. Odden suggests to create a “keyword glossary” or a list of keywords and long-tail keyword phrases.

    Verify your social keywords. This isn’t as easy as regular keyword research and takes more effort from you, but it’s worth it. Use free tools such as SocialMention, “that offer a social search function which provides a list of keywords most often create in tweets, comments and other social content based on your query,” Odden adds. Then of course, add these to your keyword vocabulary.

    Look at which social posts are most popular so you can begin to form content your viewers want to engage with. Use free tools such as Facebook Insights and Buffer, or paid tools like Social Bro.

    Maintain your social existence. Share content daily – how many times a day and at what times will depend on your industry. Keep in mind: Your social profiles are about you AND your viewers, so it’s important to share other people’s work too.

SEO and social are places for creating content. They are both used to build attentiveness, engage with customers and prospects, and drive leads. To join together them you need to create content that fits how people are searching for your company, then share or “socialize” that content across your social media networks.

The inopportune fact about SEO

Matt Cutts published a video with a very interesting topic lately. He discussed the question, if a legal and customer appreciated business can compete in gaining high rankings in the search engines with companies that concentrate in traffic acquisition. Can they?

As stated in the video, the Internet leveled the chances of big and small companies in the marketing field. It’s a playing field where anyone can compete, but the game is not leveled at all.

A role model company in search engine realism

Let’s imagine a young company and entrepreneur who try to gain the traffic they mainly deserve. They could say that they are the right in their industry. They are also well known by their customers, but in order to grow big, they are aware of the need to attract new customers. There are a variety of ways to attract clients online and search engines are measured as one of the first places they want to look for them. Gaining organic inbound traffic is treated as a necessary component of the online marketing mix.

The SEO landscape

The SEO landscape has shifted over time. Google’s Panda & Penguin updates made SEO professionals change their tactics and are going towards excellence. Buying links, participating in link exchange programs and generating backlinks from spammy content farms are not an approach anymore.

SEO still is a process where not only marketing, but also technical knowledge is required. For example:

organizing website’s structure and navigation

preparing a sitemap

preparing SEO friendly url’s

optimizing web pages’ titles and describing images

regulating instructions for web robots in robots.txt

backlinks management

These elements might sound obvious, but also could be a difficult part of optimization. As SEO has changed and it has become more content centric, still the technical aspects are significant as a necessary foundation.

Content marketing, commonly called as the new SEO is aimed to offer valuable information to users. People all over the world are actively seeking answers. The content, if properly crafted, could control the user and be the spark that would turn a user into a customer. The young company is aware that in the new algorithm changed search reality, producing quality content is a must. They put in their time and resources to produce content that’s original, engaging and creates value. They care about distribution; they offer coverage with social media and wait for the results.

Content and its impact on rankings

Creating superb and timeless content that lasts is a very difficult task. Most of the content produced, despite the fact that it’s important, is temporary. The results of this kind of content could be temporary, as well as the interest of user, since the provided information becomes outdated. Do you care what SEO looked like 2 years ago? What counts is here and now. Still, the impact of these kinds of activities is hardly noticeable when talking about rankings. In the top of SERPs, sometimes the spammy feel or unrelated, but topnotch optimized sites are visible in higher positions. Why is it so?

The gray SEO reality

SEO is a hard and constantly changing process. It’s becoming more diversified and demanding. There is a vast number of do’s and don’ts that companies should stick with, in order to get results. Although it’s going towards a more human approach, the SEO specialists still have a important advantage over business do-it-yourself competition.

Organic traffic isn’t free

Search engines are programs that crawl the web looking for information. They are using difficult algorithms to index and deliver us relevant results. Although their features and provided results are getting better and better, they are still programs. Thanks to this, they can be predictable.

There are a lot of indicators that tell the search engines that your content is the right one to show to the user, besides the relevancy. Even if the content is superb, that’s not enough. SEO professionals have experience, knowledge about factors and techniques to convince the search engine about the content’s importance. Therefore they are able to gain high rankings. That’s the cause why good content, confronted with professionalized SEO, often stays out of the SERPs.

You can guess that the high rankings in search engines aren’t free. If there is money, the SEO process that leads to making more income is becoming more professional too.

Why is it so hard for companies to breach into SERPs and get organic traffic?

When companies struggle to get the high position and get organic traffic, they compete in an uneven fight. Although the organic results aren’t paid, they have a cost. If it’s not money, it’s the time necessary to gain the knowledge and to develop valuable content. It also requires a strategy and lots of analytical preparation, aimed to distribute it and engage the audience. The technical requirements make it even more difficult. Building a brand online and competing with professionals who concentrate in driving traffic from search engines costs a lot of time and effort. It’s like taking part in a sports competition, where most of the contestants are pro’s and you’re just a rookie.

Final thoughts

SEO is demanding. For entrepreneurs who are trying to get new customers and build a brand online little can be done. Since Google is the global number one, we are thankful to play by its rules (and as a matter of fact, we let them set the standards). Bare in mind that SEO is a long term process, where rankings aren’t the ultimate goal. You have to do the research, create a plan, publish valuable content and distribute it via social media. Finally, you have to converse with the public.

If you’re going to be organized, you’re going to get inbound traffic and ultimately your efforts will earn you a place in the SERPs beyond your competition. It’s a steep and long road. If you feel discouraged about SEO, and I admit, that you could be, Google prepared a place on the side and on the top of the results page, for clients who want to get instant effects. For the rest of us, it’s either one way or the other you’ll have to pay for SEO, or get to know SEO and work your way up.