Robots

What is a Robots.txt file?

A Robots.txt is a “file that is added to your server, to prevent Search Engine Spiders from crawling to certain sections of your site, or your entire site”.

The Robots.txt file is easy to create, as its a simple notepad file. It’s a major tool used by illegal sites to survive on the Internet.  But there are some valid advantages to it as well.

These are some reasons why people use Robots.txt file, or why you should use it:

 1.  If you don’t want your unfinished site to already appear in public.
 2.   It can help you escape from spammers, who try to collect email addresses.
 3.   You have sensitive information that you do not wish to be shared.  Porn Sites, come under this category.
 4.   You can cut off specific pages from the Search Engine Listing, and that can be a useful advantage.
 5.   It can act as an invitation for bots to crawl to your site as well.

New Google Rich Snippets

Google Rich Snippets Tool with Fresh Look

 Google Rich Snippets Tool will helps to know that "how the website will be displayed in search results". Mostly SEO's who are familiar with Micro data will use this tool to test the RDF implementation across the website. Google has improved the UI of this tool with fresh and clean look.

http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/richsnippets

Using the Micro Data for your website at all possible areas which will in result helps Google to understand better about your website. E-commerce portals, Reviews websites, Business Listing directories should definitely have Micro Data for better results. Bloggers also should use author Micro Data for better visibility.

Google Search Result

 Google Custom Search

SEO Quiz

Questions and answers

1.  What should be ideal keyword density? (select one answer)

   1. 1-3%
   2. 3-5%
   3. 5-7%
   4. 7-15%
   5. Depends on a page
   6. Any value will do
   7. What is keyword density?

Explanation: There is no “right” or “ideal” keyword density. In fact, any value will do, from 0% (no target keyword on a page) to 100% (page’s content consist of only one keyword). Keyword density was one of the major ranking factors in the dawn of search engine era, but now it plays no role in SEO.

2.  Which way of filling the META keywords tag is the best in terms of ranking? (select one answer)

   1. Any way will do
   2. Separate keywords with commas
   3. Separate keywords with spaces
   4. Separate keyword with spaces and phrases with commas
   5. Any way will do assuming you put in your target keywords
   6. Any way will do as long as you put no more than 10 keywords in it

Explanation: There is no optimal way of filling the META keywords tag, because this tag is not important for ranking anymore. It doesn’t influence the rank of your website, so you can easily forget about it, or fill it any way you like since it is ignored anyway.

3.  Should you prefer underscores to dashes in filenames? (select one answer)

   1. Yup, underscores are better
   2. No, dashes are better
   3. No difference
   4. Some search engines prefer underscores, others prefer dashes

Explanation: Really, there is no difference. Search engines are capable of reading any filenames and they don’t prefer any of the word separation symbols to others in terms of ranking. Also, filenames have only a tiny impact on search engine rankings, so you can name them any way you want.

Most Important Online Marketing Tactics

Below are what I believe are the most important online marketing tactics for any small business. Focus on these actions before trying the chase this week’s new, new thing.
1. Research and revisit a catalog of keyword topics
Your entire content strategy should be informed by a catalog ofthemes and topics you visit and revisit in a predictable manner.
2. Produce content people will share
Once you’ve developed a plan for the topics you intend to cover on a frequent basis, you must learn how to produce content that people want to share.
The most important element is value. Value is generally found in showing people how to do something they want to do, where to find resources that can make their life easier and providing insight into an industry challenge or trend.
3. Use social networks to enhance email and attract links
Turn to social networks as a way to create awareness for your content and network for links. Share other people’s content as a way to increase value and attract links. Amplify your best content as a way to build your email list.
4. Claim vast amounts of real estate
Go out there and build your Google+, Facebook and LinkedIn profiles, even if you have no time or plan to build large followings. Create YouTube, Slideshare and Picassa profiles. Claim and enhance your Google+Local, Yahoo and Bing Local profiles.
5. Drive leads to landing pages
You must embrace the use of landing pages for all of you advertising, email marketing and social outreach
6. Split test as much as you can
Testing is often an after thought and that’s a shame. Businesses that get in the habit of testing everything, right from the beginning, have such a competitive advantage over those that leave everything to chance.
7. Use funnels to measure and drive conversion
Google Analytics allows you to build funnels that match your paths and score and analyze each phase of the funnel so that you can understand not only the impact of each element, but your entire conversion system.

SEO reputation management

Why SEO reputation management is so important ?

Reputation is the most important thing for every organization. Without it no customer will want to avail the services and products of any organization who is lacking it. So how to create it, and if already created, how to maintain it?

There will be many aspects of the term reputation. Its a very huge and important term and I am not sufficient or capable enough to answer each and every aspect of it. Thats why we will be discussing only those points which will be helpful to create and strengthen SEO reputation management in the online world.
Reputation is very closely related to how any particular organization carries the advertising and marketing of itself. This phenomenon can be easily witnessed. Organizations target women and children to create and strengthen their brand name. These organizations know that being acceptable in family can boost their reputation. And the best way to do is by targeting the most emotional part of those families i.e. children and women.



There can be scores of tools and methods available for reputation management services. But when it comes to online world, there is no better option then to go for Search Engine Reputation Management. Why so? Because getting a better rank in search engines itself creates and strengthens the brand name, courtesy SEO reputation management. But not every organization is competent enough with these SEO reputation management services. These organizations relate SEO services and SEO reputation management. But it is not so. These two thing although looks and sound similar but are completely different from each other. You can say that Online Reputation Management is a much improvised form of the SEO based services. But the organizations who are competent in SEO services ca not always deliver a quality SEO reputation management services. So it is very important that the service of SEO reputation management offering organization is availed for best results.

Bounce Rate and Click-through Rate

What is Bounce Rate and how to use it.

Summarized overview In this article you will find discussion and definitions of:

    Bounce rate
    Click-through rate

You will also find information about:

    What bounce rate will tell you
    Why bounce rate is important

And, how to use bounce rate to:

    Improve your site
    Measure the effect of content changes.

What is Bounce Rate?

The bounce rate for the homepage, or any other page through which visitors enter your site, tells you how many people 'bounce' away (leave) from your site after viewing one page.  So, if the bounce rate from your homepage is 30% (which is relatively low), that means that 30% of your visitors ‘bounce away’ from your homepage.  The concept is designed to tell you how your homepage performs. Keep in mind that different types of resources, for example, products, services, or information, will have different bounce rates and usage patterns.

How can I improve my bounce rate?

As a first step, consider updating your entry pages to decrease the bounce rate. Start with your homepage. Think about the old adage that “first impressions are the most important”.  Websites do not get a second chance to make an impression. If you are expending energy to attract visitors, you should be putting at least as much energy into keeping them, if not more.  Use a visitor tracking service to find out what search terms people are using to find your site: if visitors are leaving quickly, make sure that your content and search terms are well-matched; the cause of a high bounce rate may be that visitors are not finding what they expected.  Check your exit pages to see where most of your visitors are leaving and try to determine why they leave, especially if that is not where you intend them to leave from.

What is Click-through rate?

Click-through rate (or click-thru rate) tells you how many people are clicking through to your site from a third-party. For example from a link, search engine, banner, advertising or email campaign.  Your click-through rate tells you the success of your campaigns. Use this knowledge to determine which strategy is the most effective and focus your energy there.
Use bounce rate to measure the effect of content changes.

A good way to make use of your bounce rate stats is to measure the efficacy of content changes. When you make a content change, record your bounce rate. Then make a comparison after a week and see if you are encouraging visitors to move further into your site.
The bounce rate stats that we have designed can also tell you how far into your site visitors are surfing. We have designed a bounce rate feature that graphically shows how many people bounce after viewing, for example, three pages.

To view an example of a bounce rate, login to our demo, and view the Opentracker.net bounce rate statistics.
There are many theories about how to draw visitors further into your site. Make sure that your clickpaths are intuitive, and lead visitors further into your site. Some analysts suggest that this is best accomplished by orienting your site more towards browsing visitors than searching visitors, and ‘pulling’ them deeper to explore your content, instead of ‘pushing’ them directly to specific information.

Cookies

• Its set of information about visitor or visitors computer
• Calculate the individual and unique visitors
• If you turn off the cookies you cant view the some website
• Using by java script code

Types of cookies:

• First party cookies

• Third party cookies

We can use all types or some of or one the cookies in the goggle analytics

Temporary cookie:

•     Stored only in the browser and its disappears when the browser has quit

Persistent cookie:

•     Stored only in the hard drives it will be calculate the subsequent visitor expires after 2 yrs

10 Dead Simple Tips to Take Advantage of Google+ for SEO

It's no secret. When engineers built Google+, they constructed an SEO juggernaut to dominate search results above all other social platforms. Although Facebook and Twitter are essential to marketing efforts, both restrict Google from accessing much of their data. This limits their SEO effectiveness.
Not so with Google+.

Here’s an experiment: If you use Google+, perform a search for your name and check the domain distribution of first 100 results. The graph below shows what happens when searching my own name.

Even though I use Twitter and Facebook far more often, Google+ dominates the search results. Google+ even beats SEOmoz and my own blog. Multiply this for 100's of millions of people, and you can begin to comprehend the scope of Google's platform.
Fortunately, there are several ways to take advantage of this SEO domination for your own benefit.

 

1. Follow your profile links

 

Consider this: at SEOmoz you must earn 200 Mozpoints before earning a followed profile link (submit good comments!) On the other hand, Google+ not only allows you to link to your other profiles across the web, but you can embed followed links directly into your bio with the anchor text of your choice.

The value of a link from Google+ is, in theory, like any other. It depends on the authority of both the page and domain. My own profile shows the following metrics:

• MozRank: 1.91
• PageAuthority: 49
• PageRank: 3

If you can raise your visibility by getting more people to engage with you, share your posts, or link directly to your profile, the more valuable your profile links become.

2. Embed post links

 

Like profile links, Google+ also allows you to insert followed links directly into your posts – as many as you want. Simply insert the full URL and Google will automatically format it as a link.
The value of these links increases the number of times the post is shared, linked to and +1’ed.
For example, check out this one sentence post from Alexia Tsotsis, which has a PageRank of 3 and is cached by Google every couple of weeks. (Even though PageRank is not highly correlated with rankings, for Google+ it’s often the only metric available.)

If your post goes viral or is reshared by high-authority profiles, the value of those links increases.

3. Optimize your G+ title tags

The first sentence of your Google+ post becomes part of the title tag, which is highly correlated with rankings and greatly influences click-through rates. Choose your keywords carefully and consider that the first sentence will be the first thing most people see.
Check out how this simple post from Danny Sullivan ranks for its title.

A widely shared post with a good title has an excellent chance of ranking for its given keywords.

4. Unlimited editing power

Google+ is just like your own mini personal blogging platform. This means you can fully edit any of your posts at any time. Not so with Facebook or Twitter. Facebook gives you only limited editing abilities. Twitter, after you tweet, only lets you delete.
This is important if your Google+ post goes viral and you want to make updates or changes. If need be, you can also update the title tag and any attached media as well.
You may not own the platform, but Google+ gives you a broad amount of control over your own content.

5. Index new content lightning fast

 

If you share new content on Google+, chances are that Google will index the page very quickly.
Rumor has it that new URLs are crawled almost instantly. This makes complete sense as part of the purpose of Google+ was to replace Twitter when creating Google's Realtime Search.
In the old days, if you wanted a website indexed you filled out a webform and waited several weeks. Today, it's as simple as pressing a +1 button.

“Google+ is the new Google Submit URL box.”
- Rand Fishkin, GROW 2012 Source

Share your new content on Google+, as well as your other social networks, for quick indexation.

6. Stalk Connect with influencers 

 

Google+ lists 17 different notification triggers that can help you connect with influencers in your industry.
Depending on the individual's account settings, these notifications can take the form of an email, phone SMS, or the omnipresent red Google notification bar.

17 actions that trigger notifications:

1. Mention them in a post 
2. Share a post with them directly 
3. Share a post and you're in a circle they subscribe to 
4. Comment on a post they created 
5. Comment on a post after they comment on it 
6. Add them to a circle 
7. Suggest new people to add to their circles 
8. Tag them in a photo 
9. Tag one of their photos 
10. Suggest a profile photo for them
11. Comment on a photo after they comment on it 
12. Comment on a photo they are tagged in 
13. Comment on a photo they tagged 
14. Start a conversation with them
15. Send them an invitation or update an event
16. Remind them about events
17. Any activity on events they created 

Several folks have introduced themselves to me on Google+ by "gently" using the methods above.
Be warned: the few who crossed the line into spamminess have been banned from several inboxes forever.

7. Optimize your author pic for more traffic

 

Last spring, I performed a series of tests with my Google+ author photo that led to an increase in the click-though rate for my websites.

If you successfully implement the author tag and have a catchy photo, it often doesn't matter if you rank 2nd, 3rd or even 4th. With an eye-catching pic you can often grab free traffic away from even your competitor's #1 ranking.

8. Test drive a G+ social media dashboard

Google Analytics has progressed greatly with social media reporting, but if you live and die by social traffic you want to bring the information front and center.
Adam Singer created an awesome social media dashboard that you can use for free. At one glance you can view all your essential metrics from Google+ traffic and all other social networks including:

• On Site Social Actions, i.e. Google +1's
• Revenue per Visit by Social Network
• Overall Traffic Stats by Social Source

Bonus: Install this dashboard for free in your Google Analytics account by clicking here.

 

9. Check your CircleRank

My favorite new tool is CircleCount. Try it now by pasting in your Google+ URL to chart your daily follower growth, the virality of your posts, and even see your "CircleRank" score compared against all other Google+ profiles.

CircleRanks of note:

• Rand Fishkin: 2,214
• Barack Obama: 43
• Brittany Spears: 1

The election is over. Brittany won.

 

10. Be an awesome (Late) early adopter

 

Even with it's explosive growth, only 1 in 4 people use Google+ once a month. The rest log in even less, although this number is growing fast.
None of these tips matter unless you actually use Google+. Out of the 400 folks I've circled in my Google+, only about 75 actively participate. No surprise, these tend to be the more savvy SEO and media types.
There's still time. Folks are catching on. Yes, early adopters win the day.
You can do Google+ in less than 10 minutes a day. This means creating a few simple habits to fit it into your workflow.

• Press the +1 button to spread share worthy comment
• ...  add comments on the truly great stuff
• Add +1 Buttons on Your Own Content
• Engage / Comment / Reshare / Start a Hangout / Create an Event
• Circle Great People
• Make it Easy for People to Circle You...

Business.txt

One of the latest webmaster things floating around the web today is on the business.txt file.

It is based on the concept of a robots.txt file but is there to give business owners an easy way to give search engines and local search engines a way to discover the business address

Business.txt is a file that local businesses upload to their website with their business information so all website providers can update it whenever something is changed. It is located typically at the root of the domain under a file, /business.txt.

Business.txtlooks like a Great Idea for Local Visibility

Wouldn’t it be great for small business owners if, rather than having to seek out and manage their business listings on dozens of local directories, they could manage that information solely on their own websites?

The idea is that the business owner puts all of his/her local data into a simple text file (business.txt) — name, address, phone, hours, lat-long coordinates, short description, long description and much more.

And then websites like Yelp and Foursquare and Google+ Local would rely on this trusted data, rather than expect the business owner to come manage the data at each specific directory site.

Darren Shaw and the Whitespark crew have already created a Business.txt generator even though this idea is barely off the ground.

Business.txt generator - http://www.whitespark.ca/business-txt-generator

• Websites have outdated information
• A file with all the information of the local business in a standard format
• Websites will get that file and update their information when something changes
• Users will know and read the latest information

Business.txtwith a basic info

Name: RJ Grunts

Categories: American Restaurant, Bar

Street: 2056 North Lincoln Park W (at Dickens Ave.)

Zip: 60614

City: Chicago

State: Illinois

Country: United States

Coordinates: 41.92012, -87.63645

Phone: (1) 773-929-5363

Open: Mon-Fri 11.30am-12am, Sat 10am-12am, Sun 10am-9pm

Website: http://www.doaminname.com/

SEO Tips for a New Website Owner

A Few Things to Keep in Mind

It’s a Long Road

SEO isn’t something that you can expect to accomplish overnight. It takes work and lots of it in order to get to where you want to be. SEO never sleeps, so if you spend time slacking when it comes to keeping up with your website; you will not get the results you seek.

Do It Yourself

While many people are under the impression that one must hire an SEO Specialist in order to get the job done; you can actually do it all yourself. The internet has vast amounts of information at your disposal, which can be used to your benefit.

Check Out the Competition and Research Keywords

In order to figure out what is going to work for you, it’s important to keep track of sites related to yours. Let’s say your site is about cats. Simply go to a keyword research site (we like the AdWordsKeyword Tool). 

Site and Page Names are Important

When creating a URL name, be sure to select something that has keywords included in it. You want your site name to be easily remembered and something that Search Engines are immediately going to recognize as being categorized in the proper niche.

Using Links Properly

If you are going to be linking internally, you want to be sure to use a helpful Anchor Text. Simply saying ‘Click Here’ does nothing as far as SEO is concerned, as it offers no information for Search Engines to work with.

Content is King

Of course, the most important thing when it comes to any website is content. You can do everything else right but if your content is not updated frequently and of high quality; your efforts will be pointless. Be sure to think about what your viewers want from your site and worry about Search Engines last on this one.