OVBlogger: Blogging and SEO

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So, I’m over with the Hexa Track guys checking out their new product Google Goggles. No, you can’t get it yet, but if you’re an AdWords buff like me… You’ll enjoy watching their video.

Go to

http://www.putonyourgoggles.com/

and opt in.

This new software will analyze your page and tell you what your quality scores will be at Google. Not only that, but it will show you what’s working and what’s not.

I’m interested because it will take the guesswork out of the whole time-consuming process. And, it’s a slow process, if you’re not a guru at this, which I’m certainly not. But it totally interests me and so, I’m still studying the art of AdWords.

I worked on “list building” for a while before we got all those keywords to have a “Great” quality score and for Google to give us cheap clicks because the lower your quality score, the more you’ll pay for them. So, it’s a lot of tweaking and testing until it suits the Google ghods’ fancy.

If you’re really smart at AdWords, you can do it much more quickly than me, but like I said, I ain’t no guru. I just think AdWords is totally fascinating and something that you really need to study to get it right.

We’ll see how expensive Google Goggles is and if I can afford it. But I totally want it already and they’ve only put one video out. I’m excited!  I was lucky enough to get in on Hexa Track before they shut down memberships, and it’s totally cool. So, I’m thinking this has to be awesome, as well.

And be sure to pick up the free .pdf. I’m off to read mine now. Ciao!

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So, today, I had the first two hours of Squeezathon on the phone and the lines were lit up. I didn’t stop talking for two hours! It was awesome! Over the past couple of days we helped 250+ people to get their squeeze pages up and running. (That we know about.) Feels very good, indeed.

But I had one call that disturbed me, and thought I’d blog about it so that maybe it can help someone else.

One man had a page that is #1 on Google, and he was hesitant to put a squeeze page on his website as the front door. Now, any smart marketer knows that the squeeze page always, always, always goes first, right? Well, that’s a little hidden secret that a lot of people just don’t understand. Every single thing you do online should be geared toward list building.

So, I asked how much traffic he was getting from Google. He told me 30K hits in the past three months. Not too shabby, not at all.

But I looked at his stats. He had a 4 million + Alexa ranking. Hmm… That didn’t compute. I think his stats were pretty far off.

Knowing that, I asked what his keyword was. I won’t type it in here because I don’t want anyone to realize who this person was. My intention isn’t to embarrass anyone. So, let’s just say it was a really obscure keyword. In fact, when I checked it on SEOBook, there were NO results whatsoever for it.

What’s the big lesson?

You can have a No. 1 ranking in Google, but if nobody is searching for that keyword, it DOESN’T MATTER. I mean, I can have the #1 spot for “raccoon clothes,” but it’s not going to bring my little tailor shop any hits, you know? People have to be actively searching for your keywords or your ranking, no matter how high it is just doesn’t matter. Not a hoot.

Do some keyword research before deciding what keywords to target. If the keyword has been searched for at least 10,000 times in a month, it’s probably a pretty good keyword. I mean, you might have stronger keywords in the list that pops up, but you also have to determine how competitive they are. You don’t want to try to compete for a keyword like “pets” for example because the competition is too high. Find something lower on the list, and something pretty specific, too.

Here’s an example:

If you search chairs, you’re going to have tons of competition.

If you look further down the list, you might find “office chairs.” Well, that might still be too competitive.

But what about “leather office chairs”? That’s a bit narrower.

But what if you used “black leather office chairs”? That’s a long-tail keyword that might get some very targeted traffic to your website and if you’re selling black leather office chairs, your chance of converting your visitor, who is looking for such a specific item, to a sale just  skyrocket.

So, two things to take away:

1. If you’re using a keyword nobody is searching for, you can be #1 on the page at Google, but it won’t do you any good.

2. Never try to compete for the most competitive keywords. Choose specific long-tail phrases and not only get more traffic, make more sales, as well.

How ’bout that?

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I often go to sites like 103 Bees and HitTail to figure out what the heck people are searching for, and how they got to my blog. One of the most searched keywords in my list happens to be http://inventory.overture.com, a site that used to give you a pretty good rule of thumb when it came to keywords.

But stop looking at that folks! It’s either totally dead or it just won’t give you updated information. The last time the list of keywords was updated was in January 2007, and you don’t want to base your SEO on outdated search stats.

Here are a few places you can go, if you want some great keywords:

Aaron Wall’s SEO Book: http://SEOBook.com

I totally like this one. Aaron Wall is a respected SEO, and his tool is pretty comprehensive. You get stats from the big three (Google, Yahoo, and MSN), but a whole lot more, like links to Google Trends, Google Keyword Selection Tool, Quintura, and more. Pretty cool.

WordTracker’s Free Tool: http://freekeywords.wordtracker.com

This is a pretty basic search, and if you loved Overture, you’ll like this one, just as well. It’s a bare bones keyword search.

Good Keywords: http://goodkeywords.com

This is a bit of free software you can download. Good Keywords is a great way to get suggestions and it combines words to give you long-tail phrase ideas, as well.

Those are three good suggestions for you to replace Overture. If SEOBook’s keyword discovery tool is too complicated for you, try one of the other options. I’m sure you’ll find that one works quite nicely for you.

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If you’re into stats and analytics, like I can be, you probably should know about Hit Tail.

You can get some pretty cool long-tail ideas from it to use in posts, web pages, articles, whatever. My most searched phrase happens to be “how to embed video” in various combinations, like “on Blogger,” “on My Space,” and in “WordPress,” of course. That’s pretty neat to know.

So, how can I use that?

I’m going to produce a video soon to go along with the article that I wrote here a few months back: “How to Embed Video in a WordPress Blog,” and I’m going to put it up in all the usual places. I mean, it’s so simple to do, it’s ridiculous, but people who don’t know how to do it are obviously looking for the “how-to.” Cool. Hit Tail told me so.

It also tells me what keywords people searched for to get to my blog today, like “netslingers,” “seo matrix,” and “scribd ban.” Hmm… other people must be pissed about that, too. But I know what they’re interested in learning more about. Also cool.

Sub-domains, Ross Goldberg Call, StomperNet videos, and How to Blog course are my “suggestions.” Great. I have a How to blog course at http://Blogging4Boomers.com. Check that out.

But you see how valuable knowing this kind of stuff is? I look at it periodically to see what interests people most. I can use the information in so many different ways that it really makes sense to have such an account, right?

The basic account at Hit Tail is free but for an upgrade, it’s only $9.95 a month. Check it out, and I’m sure you’ll see the possibilities in having this very cool and basic information.

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