Archive for February, 2007

Since we are on the topic of links… I thought I’d do a few tips on how to acquire good links. It’s one thing to know how to identify a good link, but quite another knowing how to get one. So here we go…

The ultimate “no-brainer” way to get links: directory submission. Here is a great article on some of the best directories to submit to. One directory submission service we’ve used is the Best Web Directories. I was skeptical at first, but they are very professional, and give you very detailed reporting on which directories have accepted/denied you. If you are just launching a site, I don’t recommend submitting to multiple directories right away. I’ve read that if 25%+ of your incoming links are from directories, Google may get suspicious as this looks very unnatural.

But, by all means, start with some of the bigger directories like dmoz, and BOTW. Then as you grow your link popularity, start adding directory links slowly.

—> Here is a related article: Getting Your Website Listed in DMOZ

 

This will wrap up our series on how to identify a good link.  I hope it was informative…

Here is Today’s Tip:

Don’t waste your time trying to get any link you can get your hands on.  What constitutes a “bad” link?  Just follow the last 9 tips I provided, and you should be fine.  Just always remember this when linking:  1 good link is always better than 100 questionable links.

And if all else fails, just use the traditional method… acquire links that will attract human visitors.  You don’t always have to look at links through the eyes of a search engine…

Yet another post about search engine marketing… if you get tired of it please let me know!
Google releases huge updates so fast and so often, that they deserve proper attention. They are so funny about new releases… there is never any fanfare or press releases. They just keep on quietly making internet shaking improvements without so much as a peep.

Well, recently, it happened again, although this time it was much easier to notice… Ever heard the term Google Slap? On Feb. 16, Google released an Adwords update that most commentators are calling Google Slap 3.0, since it is the 3rd time something similar to it has happened.

Basically, Google has taken a few factors including: quality of advertisement, % of clicks on your advertisement, and keyword relevancy on your landing page.

Based on those factors, they rate each of your keywords with a “Great”, “Ok”, or “poor” score. And… here is the kicker, based on the keyword and your score, your minimum bid amount will change. If you have a very poor score on a popular keyword, your minimum bid amount could raise significantly. In some cases over $10!!!

To find out your score:

1. Login in to your adwords account
2. Click on a campaign
3. Click the Keywords Tab
4. Click on Customize Columns
5. Click “Show Quality Score”
6. View the score for each keyword

If you have been slapped with a “poor” rating, and your minimum bid has gone through the roof, try the following remedies:

• Improve the language of the advertisement to better reflect that keyword
• Create a custom landing page that includes the keywords you are targeting

This should clear things up for the most part.

I’m still unclear on how successful this will be… from an advertisers perspective, if you don’t have your ads in order, you may get a serious slapping. But if the content on your pages matches the keywords, you should be fine. There is no question that Google will make more money from this, but it should also help advertisers to target their ads in a more direct way.

Here is Today’s Tip:

Pay close attention to the quality of the pages linking to you. Try not to get links from spammy, repetetive pages. If the page has 400 links that all have the same anchor text, or if the content is obviously of a spam nature, stay away. If one keyword is repeated 300 times, or if the text is too small to even read, stay away. The Bottom line is that you don’t want links from crappy pages. Make sure there is good useful content. Finally, if the site is banned by Google*, STAY AWAY.

*An easy way to discover if a page is banned by Google is to look at the page rank… if the bar is gray, stay away.

I finally had a chance to sit down and review Realty Blogging, the new book by Richard Nacht & Paul Chaney of Blogging Systems. I advanced ordered it back in Novermber before it became available in Barnes & Noble… and am just now getting to it.

This is the first truly influential book on blogging in the real estate industry. They lay down a solid argument for why blogging is going to change real estate forever.

I admit, this is the first (offline) book I’ve read on blogging, so I don’t have too much experience, but I was pretty impressed. I immediately recognized the challenges that must have beset Richard & Paul in writing this book. I mean, how do you write a book when 95% of your source marterial is online?? It’s hard.

This would make a fantastic E-book! Maybe after things have calmed down, they will be able to offer an online version. The frustration I found immediately, was that I wanted to visit many of the links they referenced, but wasn’t near my computer.

Suggestion: Read this in a comfortable chair, and have a laptop close at hand.

Diving in… The first few chapters relay the importance of blogging in general, and lay the ground work for why blogging is growing so quickly. They really did a good job here of presenting blogs for what they really are: a marketing and networking tool. After that, it catapulted into the specifics of the real estate industry, and some of the nitty gritty of blogging: writing style, format, comments, trackbacks, relevance, blogrolls, basic SEO, and alot more.

I wouldn’t really recommend the book for veteran bloggers, as most of the information is pretty basic, and if you’ve been around for a while in the blogosphere, it will be stuff that you should already know. But, that being said, they hit a home run with their target audience: blossoming tech savvy real estate agents. I did however find the appendicies very helpful in the way of good resources, and again, this is where an online version would have helped. Maybe they could offer a free online pdf version for everyone that buys the book! hint… hint…

All in all, I was very pleased with the book. It really conveyed Richard & Paul’s hearts for helping real estate agents market themselves. This is a desire and passion that I share with them, and I wish them success with this great book!

Here is Today’s Tip:

We will discuss some of the strategies for aquiring links at a later date… but one of the things you want to look out for is people telling you they will link to you, but adding the <nofollow> tag to the link.  This means that the search engine will not follow the link, and therefore, it won’t count towards your link popularity.  So, if someone trys to scam you in this way because they think you are a newb, call them on it.

To find out if one of your links has the <nofollow> attribute attached to it, click view in your browser, and then “view source”.