Content Creation Using Topic Clusters for More Effective SEO

You know it wasn't long ago that you typed some broken search term like this and to Google.

Now, of course you simply ask, "where should I go for dinner?"

That's because you assume search engines are smart enough to recognize intent, but does your SEO strategy reflect this changing search behavior?

Meet the topic cluster model, an Seo strategy that focuses on topics as opposed to keywords to improve your site's architecture, make it easier for Google to discover related content and ultimately boost your search engine visibility.

Consider the average website, you start with a homepage and a block.

You've decided to target a keyword, learned that there are more than a thousand long tail variations of that term, meaning you're stuck writing post after post to capture the search traffic and in the end your site becomes repetitive, bloated, and disorganized.

In the topic cluster model, each grouping covers a single topic.

You have one larger piece of content. We'll call this the pillar that broadly outlines the topic and a defined group of cluster content focused on specific long tail keywords.

The pillar links to each cluster page, all the clusters link back to the pillar content each time with the same hyperlink. 

When one page performs well, the entire topic cluster gets a boost.

It's all about helping web crawlers make connections.Topic cluster signal with the Google that there's a semantic relationship between the content and more importantly, the you're a trusted authority on the topic worthy of the top spot.

Give this try when outlining your content.

 

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

Search Engine Optimization Strategies

seo strategiesSearch Engine Optimization Strategies. Search engine optimization

Refers to any efforts that are required to try and get your web site into the top rankings of Google (and others) search engine listing results when someone searches for your "keyword phrases". Everyone loves successful search engine optimization, because you can get lots of traffic…and…it's free!

The problem is, that no one really knows how Google decides where to rank your site and when it will show up. Any expert that tells you that they know exactly how Google's ranking works and/or guarantees that you'll get into the top spots (for a fee, of course), is being less than truthful.

Even so, there are proven techniques that you can employ to get your site into the top of the listings. We believe in being very transparent about what we're doing and why we're doing it, so we'll show you exactly what we're doing, and why it helps to skyrocket you right to the top!

Business owners have big challenges when it comes to search engine optimization:

Often, Google doesn't even know their site exists (this is VERY common). Even if Google does know about their site, it never shows up in search engine listings. Even if their site does show up in some kind of search, it's hardly ever the "keyword phrase" that the owner would like. It's very important to get the right one. Even if the owner could dictate to Google what keywords to show the site for, most business owners don't know which words and phrases are the money makers! All is not gloom and doom however!

With a little help, you can start to overcome all of these issues. Mainly open your Webmaster Tools Account and make sure your site is or can be indexed . Discover how you can gather more leads using driven traffic. Build an online business, generate leads and increase sales.

Let's face it, search engines must be able to "View" your site; and correct search engine optimization delivers search engine position allowing people to find your site and then the products you sell. Internet advertising produces Website Traffic for your business and the importance of delivering traffic and business prospects for just about any business cannot be overstated.

One of the most important additional of traffic generation is that extra traffic enhances your lead gathering function making sure relevant prospects buy from your business.

It is useless just building traffic for the sake of it unless it produces sales. That's why we focus on different web site traffic packages so that the benefits may be measured. And all our systems measure and report to you the effect of the traffic sent to your site. And you want real visitors not web bots pinging your site to record a visit.

Because so many other businesses have been disappointed by their Internet marketing results, particularly in relation to their costs, Markethive.com have endeavored to remain vendor-independent and open minded about the strategies that we design and employ for our customers.

You must have more than a valid email address and phone number on your business card. You need a high traffic site with products to sell and – create the environment for and desire for the prospect to buy from your product catalog.

After all the suspect is the person who originally responded to your web site traffic, flyer, mailing, newspaper advertisement or some other means you employed to capture their attention or original information. The important thing here is, has enough interest has been sparked in the lead to respond back to you.

Another very important question also arises here is; did the promotion material that caused the original response and subsequently the enquiry to your website fulfill its intended purpose. In other words; did the information you supplied that elicited the response from the suspect, was it relevant to your business or are you getting leads from people who misunderstood your message.

When does this Google madness end?

Nobody knows. Everybody is on board though trying to grab whatever piece of return they can from Google Organic results. Hey, it’s free, what else do you want? If you are a business owner who has jumped into the online waters, I’m sure that you are frustrated as hell hearing a million ideas and million methods from a million people. And you also know that there’s no such thing as “free advertising” in our world, at least not yet. So until then, you might want to keep on reading.

“The secret to SEO”. This is a boring title basically because of the fact that it sounds like a generic get rich theme that we Americans are subject to on a daily basis. So all you business owners and work from homers must listen to me.

THERE’S NO SECRET TO SEO.

It’s very basic and I’m sure you have read this in a lot of places; it’s content. But many sources fail to mention that it has to be relevant content. I tell each of my clients the same thing and it has 3 major clauses;

1- Original Fresh Content
2- Popularity of your site
3- Maintenance
4- Existence

Original and Fresh Content is not as easy as it sounds.

We are talking about unique information that will move people to your site. See, the problem with many companies showing up on the top page today is that their pages are optimized for Google with a combination of nonsense sentences and keywords. So, my approach is, why not build a website that actually is optimized for humans? When you do this, you are automatically taking care of the optimization for Google. Come on people, we all know that Google has game and they’re increasing their technology every day finding ways to get rid of this “optimization” deal. Google is always on the side of the users and never the advertisers keep that in mind.

Guess what, once you have original and fresh content, people are going to want to visit your site and link to your site. Hey, we just took care of Popularity as well. I’m not saying you do not have to work on the link exchange thing but I promise that it will be minimal. Also you want to stay away from link farms, link exchange offers and paying for links. So I hear that question, how else am I going to bring links to my site?

The answer is content. Write articles, submit it to article sites. Prepare a PR, submit it to Prweb.com. Believe me; all these will bring links to your site. All you have to do is, mention your website at the end of these articles and make sure you link to your site with your advertised link text.

Now you are thinking, “That’s it; I have the content and the links, I’m the king of Google”. That would be wrong. Always remember that while you are doing content and popularity, there are a million competitors doing that and more. So you want to Maintain your content. You want to update it every week so every time Google spiders come to visit your site, they find new useful information. Keep up with daily life and updated news. For example, if you sell farming supplies and the price of grain goes up, you should write an article and put it in your site. Also publish those articles on other articles sites. You can find these sites easily with a “article submit” search on Google.

And the last but not least would be Existence.

I don’t want to get all philosophical but you have to have some type of existence online. Try to search for your company name on Google and see how many results you get; that’s your existence. You could also name this one “Brand Recognition”. You want to increase that so when somebody searches for farming supplies, they must see your name. You can do this easily by writing articles and Press Releases on a weekly basis. The more you write, the more circulation you will get. If you have a great piece of article or information, acquire a list of media outlets such as local and national newspapers, and fax it to them.

They just might bite pick it up. Always remember to include your website at the end as a source and you might have yourself a million dollar making, traffic getting website, Google top ranking website !!!

Tuneup

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

Why Alexa for SEO success

The Alexa Toolbar: Why You Need this Piece of "%#*&%@#".

Google Uses Alexa’s Information For Ranking and Indexing!

So you’re probably wondering why I have the Alexa Toolbar Installed on my browser and why I tell my fellow marketers, webmasters and SEO gurus to do the same.

It’s simple. The Alexa  toolbar monitors all my surfing and collects information about what domains I visit. They don’t know that it’s “me” – they collect it as anonymous user data and use it to rank web sites. Not only does Alexa use this information for determining where people surf on the web but so does google. Let me repeat that fact so it sinks in:

Google Uses Alexa’s Information For Ranking and Indexing!

Installing the Alexa toolbar and surfing your own site will absolutely help you get your sites indexed by Google more quickly. I just started this blog today, and the googlebot has already come by without any inbound links!

Because the Alexa toolbar is such a pile, no one ever keeps it installed. So just by updating and surfing your own site daily, (assuming NO ONE else does), you can get your Alexa ranking from 5,500,000 or “no data” to around 300,000 in under a month and to 100,000 in 3 months.

Alexa Rankings and Google PR are two of the main factors uninformed people look at when considering link exchanges. (Page Rank is completely useless BTW we have a white hat PR 4 site that gets 20 visitors a day and unranked sites that get several thousand per day).

If you remember the Nielsen Company, famous for the Nielsen Ratings, you understand that what is put on television was once determined by what a minute fraction of TV viewers watched: The people with a Nielsen box on their TV Set – The Nielsen Families. Having the Alexa toolbar installed on your browser is like being a Nielsen Family for the web. Your surfing habits will determine what is most “popular” and what sites should be ranked higher in the SERPs.

That was reason enough for me to install the Alexa Tool Bar. Download it for yourself, and watch your Alexa Rankings Skyrocket over the next several weeks. We know Google looks at the Information, which means that Yahoo and MSN are probably looking at it too.

Alexa’s Toolbar is a Great POWERFUL SEO tool.

Just a reminder to make sure you have the Alexa tool bar plugin installed. It is an important tool among others. But I consider the Alexa tool the most important plug in for Internet Marketers.

Install Alexa Tool Bar

Join Markethive

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden

Win Mindshare to Influence Your Market

Win Mindshare to Influence Your Market

 

Years ago Peter Drucker, the father of business consulting, made a very profound observation:

“Because the purpose of business is to create a customer, the business enterprise has two—and only two—basic functions: marketing and innovation. Marketing and innovation produce results; all the rest are costs. Marketing is the distinguishing, unique function of the business.”

Yet the marketing function is broad, challenging, and often misunderstood, especially at the small to mid-market level. The Fortune 500 and savvy mid-market consumer products companies approach the marketing function from a fundamentally different angle from that of most small to mid-market companies:

They start with market research and devise a focused, comprehensive strategy to penetrate their market, build their brand, and win mindshare before they enter a market.

The typical small to mid-market company is focused on sales, a tactical function of the marketing process, and gives little thought to researching the market, building a brand, and winning mindshare. When you consider the mindset of the typical small to mid-market CEO, this makes sense; most were very-skilled and well-trained engineers, salespeople, or finance people prior to starting their own company or taking over the top role.

Winning Mindshare Starts with Positioning Strategy

If you believe in Drucker’s observation, then the most important part of marketing strategy, the positioning and branding strategy, should be owned by the CEO of a small to mid-market company. It’s simply too important to delegate to a consultant or tactical marketer.

Positioning and branding can be complicated, so to get started, think about the one thing you’d like your product/service/company to be known for – the mindshare that you’d like to own.

To win mindshare and influence your market, follow these steps at the highest level:

  1. Determine the mindshare you want to win.
  2. Create a brand strategy that embodies the mindshare you seek to own.
  3. Use a systematic approach for all your marketing and sales activities.

Tools for Creating Your Strategy

This short article isn’t meant to trivialize these tasks; all three can be very challenging for a mid-market company. It’s simply meant to give CEOs and marketers in small to mid-market companies some direction when it comes to long term growth strategy.

If you’re a CEO of a small to mid-market company, our new eBook written with our ShortTrack CEO partners goes into greater depth on how to influence your market (it’s concept 3 in the book). Download it here. Currently it’s complimentary.

David – http://markethive.com/david-ogden