We’ve been told to think outside the box so often that it almost goes without saying; it hardly raises an…
Online reputation is still a very serious topic in the online community. As the Web continues to be a place that is under a constant state of change, it’s also important for individuals, businesses and SEO experts to keep online reputations in the forefront of their minds. There is no better time than now to reassess an online reputation and update reputation management strategies. In today’s volatile online community, it is imperative to understand the significance that having a positive online reputation can mean for a company or individual. Using the same reputation management strategy that you’ve been using for years is not going to offer the same amount of protection as it has in the past due to the rapid changes which occur in the online community almost daily. Here are just a few trends that are presently occurring in online reputation management today.
Google+ is the social network that Google runs, and it can be a great tool to use for SEO purposes since it has a couple of advantages over other social networks. First of all, Google+ ties all of the Google products together and this unification gives it an advantage over other social media networks. Another thing that makes Google+ more advantageous than even social giants like Facebook or Twitter is that these two in particular restrict some of the content shared from being accessed by Google search. Google+ will dominate search results even though the two most popular sites are used a lot more often.
There were also some changes that occurred with the Hummingbird update that makes Google+ an integral part of SEO strategies and online marketing. Google says that Plus is a service geared at connecting people online and it is designed in such a way that it will help increase a site’s rank in search engine results. Here are several ways that Google+ can be used to increase a site’s search optimization.
Directory submissions used to be a valid, white hat SEO strategy. The goal of a directory was to offer a site on which content could be placed and then linked back to another website. Essentially, it was at that time a good way to get lots of inbound links which made it perfect for SEO purposes. However, with the recent updates to the Google algorithm, specifically the Penguin update, a once popular and legitimate practice has become black hat.
Search Engine Optimization can be done in many ways. Often, custom content is written for websites that makes use of different keywords that are likely to bring perspective customers to the site. Titles of pages are changed to showcase relevant keywords on the page as well. Metadata, or descriptions and keywords embedded in the page, also play an important role in SEO. Building natural links with other websites is another way to drastically improve your search engine rank. There is one other way to boost SEO that is rarely talked about anymore. Anchor text is still important to the algorithms of search engines and can be a quick and easy adjustment to your site that might generate traffic.
A top level domain, when it comes to the internet, is most easily described as an extension at the end of the web pages name. Websites can have all different kinds of endings including .com, .org, or .net and many others. Originally, .org was for non-profit organizations, .com was for commercial websites, and .net was for networks. The ICANN, or Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, manages top-level domains. ICANN operates the IANA, or Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, as well. Here is some information about top level domains and how they can affect your company.
Google+ can be a beneficial part of an SEO campaign. For those who are not yet using Google Plus, it is likely because they do not know how to take advantage of the platform or misunderstand the nature of Google+ and how it can improve SEO results. There are several different ways to strategically use Google+ for SEO purposes.
Google+ Content
Content on Google+ is treated by the search engine just like content that is on any other web page. Any content that is placed on Google+ will be indexed and can gain page rank as well as be listed in search results by Google. This can be very beneficial since about 2/3 of all searches in the United States take place on Google. It is essential to have your content searched and indexed. The posts made on Google+ will appear as search page results which manes that some of your audience may be able to find your Google+ content through a regular search on Google. The content will be online, gain in page rank, and appear in SERPs for a long period of time. It’s even possible for some of the posts to continue ranking indefinitely – even as long as a year. Most tweets only have about a 14 minute lifespan on SERPs so one year is really good real estate.
Keeping up with a blog or a website can keep a person very busy. Developing high quality content and following all the SEO best practices are just part of the worry that an individual has to bear, not to mention how to get it ranked high in the search engine result pages (SERP). It’s important to maintain a blog or site for an established audience; but it is equally important to get it listed in the top slots of the SERPs so that more people can find it. That’s just good business. There trouble is that just about the time it is all up and running Google releases a new update like Penguin and it’s back to the drawing board.
What is Google Penguin?
Having an online presence is essential for the successful business of today. Google Penguin is really a process used to penalize black hatters who abuse the system in order to gain the advantage and manipulate the search engines into ranking their sites higher in the SERPs. Penguin is really an attempt by Google to clean up the search algorithm and reduce spam as well as site rankings that are from “questionable” sites or irrelevant because they manipulated the system to get located in the coveted 3 slots. It really aims at penalizing those who use “black hat” SEO methods like keyword stuffing, link building schemes, spamdexing, or duplicate content as well as the multitude of techniques used by some SEO companies in order to help clients gain exposure on line.
Just a few years ago SEO and social media simply coexisted. But over the last few years the line between the two began to blur. Now more than ever the major search engines use social signals as part of their ranking algorithms. In web marketing today an effective SEO strategy will be incomplete without incorporating into it the social aspect of the Web 2.0 which is built around the social element to begin with. And on the other hand, an effective social media strategy will be contributory to the SEO initiative. It is important for the two to work together in order to achieve higher rankings in the SERPs, increase site traffic and of course increase the ROI for a business. Over the last few years there have been several giants in the world of social media; but recently there have been some changing of the guard. Here three top social media platforms that should be part of any social media strategy used in an SEO campaign.