The Most Comical Google Webspam Update: Viagra Can’t Keep It Up

In an effort to thwart those who try “game Google” buy buying domains names that match the exact terms that they want to rank for, Google has completed devalued and in fact penalized “exact match domain names”.

Let’s take a look at an example of this. Let’s say that you realize that many people type “how to cook steak” in the search engines. One tactic to try to monopolize this term is to buy the exact match domain called “howtocooksteak.com” and then build a website that you hope will be the #1 result for that term. In the past, having an exact match term in the domain name drastically improved your chances of ranking for a term.

No longer.

The new Google Webspam update, which some refer to as Penguin, actually seems to count this against you and one prominent example is Viagra. As you see in the search results graphic above, Viagra.com does not rank for the term “Viagra” anymore. I had read that this was fixed (and probably will be by the time that you read this) but whatever Google datacenter that I am hitting does not return Viagra.com in a search for Viagra on the first page of the results. It actually appears half way down the second page right now.

Want another example?

You’re on it right now. This is my professional site and every single article is original and written by yours truly, Richard Cummings. I don’t do much SEO for this site and almost every inbound link is a natural one from someone who liked an article I wrote. Thus, a search for “Richard Cummings” would always return this site on the first page of Google, usually between locations 3 and 9.

Today, I don’t exist for that search term and the only reasonable conclusion is that it is an “exact match” domain issue because my site is http://richardcummings.info.

A Faulty New Google Webspam Algorithm?

The Internet is abuzz about the latest Google Panda and Webspam updates. On a personal level, I find the Viagra situation kind of funny and the fact that my site is no longer returned for my name is not going to break me. Perhaps it will return after Google implements fixes.

However, for many, this is a very serious issue.

Take a look at some of the quotes from around the Internet today.

From a user who lost nearly all rankings in one day…

Please Google. Don’t dash my hopes that 10 years of hard work building the most user friendly site in our industry wasn’t in vain…

Another web owner who lost all rankings says:

Is this the week that the world turns back to Bing and Yahoo? I for one like their new look and my website shows in the rankings as well as it ever did, which at least brings in SOME traffic to my site since Google has disowned it.

However, the saddest are posts like this:

Title: Being Ruined.

Not that it will make any difference or even get noticed but the recent update is ruining me.

I work hard to build good sites, with unique content, and the result is being dropped behind lesser sites. After all, haven’t we been taught SEO all these years as a way for people to find us based on relevancy?

I have two small boys and a wife with a brain tumor, so this is really the last thing we need, to be ruined this way without seemingly having done anything wrong. In fact, doing what we were TOLD to do!

Again, I understand this is a worthless exercise here, more for my own therapy as I try to deal with this development.

There is no question so no comments are needed.

All of these stories and more can be found on this Google Webmaster forum.

Should Google Do Anything Different?

In a recent article entitled Google Then and Now, I discussed whether Google was losing their way or finding it.

This latest change indicates to me that they are losing a bit of perspective or, at a minimum, customer appreciation.

To those honest folks–the ones who create great content and have been de-indexed, who basically lose their livelihood because of Google algorithmic changes, Google would retort, “Well, we have to do what is best for our business and, after all, you have made money off of our services for many years.”

True, however, if you look at the sum of the parts–the collective web content creators who place Google AdSense on their sites, Google has earned billions off of their efforts as well.

Don’t they owe some sort of explanation?

Google Panda Update and Article Marketing:  Initial Impression

Article marketing has always been beneficial for SEO purposes for two reasons:  One, you receive direct traffic from the articles themselves.  Two, and more importantly, you get very good benefits from the inbound links, especially from respected article directories.  In fact, as an expert eZine author, I have many articles that have attained a pagerank of 3.  Thus, I have derived great benefit from the inbound links on these pages.

My initial impression is that the Google Panda Update has definitely affected article marketing directories. For particular searches, I have noticed not only a drastic reduction of articles directories returned in the SERPs but a complete absence of them.

In the past, I knew that if I wrote an article on a certain topic and posted it to GoArticles or ArticlesBase that it would show up on page 1 in the SERPs within a matter of hours.  That just does not happen anymore (the same holds true with certain PR directories).  Typically, it does not show up at all.  As for the the granddaddy of directories, Ezine articles, they appeared to have been adversely affected by Google Panda originally but are now back in Google’s good favor.  Many pages that I have on eZinearticles still show up in the SERPs where they did in the past.

Google Panda Update and Article Marketing:  What Happened?

Many people are upset about the Google Panda Update because it has drastically reduced the amount of money that they were making and can make in the future.  However, there is no fighting this trend so adjustments are necessary.

Google is a business and their main business is search engine results.  Despite all of the cool stuff that Google produces, they still make most of their money from the ads they place on their search engine results pages.  So, if they provide poor results and people use another search engine, Google as a business would be in trouble.

Their goal with all of these Google Panda updates is to weed out bad and/or redundant results.  Again, this has angered more than a few and literally robbed some people of their livelihood.

However, the fact is that many article directories are filled with redundant, “spun” content that has no originality and exists solely to generate backlinks.  We should not be upset that Google wants to filter these results.  They must do this  to continue providing quality services.

A New Approach:  Google Panda Update and Article Marketing

With Google Panda, is article marketing now dead?  I would say “no” but add that most people need to change their approach.

Here is what I will change about my approach.  I have always written unique content and submitted this content to just a few article directories.  It was always interesting to see which one Google would pick up first. Now, I will narrow my submissions even more, with just a few unique articles going to the most important article directories, and right now that article directory is EzineArticles.

For those who have used article spinners and/or automatic submission of articles, I think this approach is not entirely dead but dying a slow death in the Post-Panda world.

Google Panda Update and Article Marketing:  Conclusion and References

The question posed in the title of this article was:  With the new Panda update, does article marketing still work?  The answer is “yes”, but you you may need to change your approach with a product like Ultimate Guest Blogger.

The world of article spinners and automatic submissions is dying a slow-death with each Google Panda update.  However, unique content submitted to quality directories still works very well.

Much has been written on the topic of article marketing in the wake of these Google Panda updates.  Here are some more articles that you may enjoy:

How Google Panda Update Impacts Article Marketing: Is Article Marketing dead? Absolutely not! Even though you might still get a little bit of link juice from a handful of article directories, the smart thing to do now is to submit exclusive content to relevant sites instead…

Did Google’s Panda Update Smash Article Marketing?: The change wasn’t anti-SEO, it was anti-SPAM…

Google Panda: Are you still focusing on article marketing?: The Google Panda update ensures that article marketing is still a good practice if you produce quality content that your visitors will appreciate and help you syndicate and share it…

Freelance Writers: 10 Reasons the Google Panda Update Makes (SEO) Article Marketing Even More Effective & Means More Work for You: Not to brag (only to prove a point), but content written by me about “SEO writing” occupies four spots on the first page of Google…

Ranking Post Panda – Is Article Marketing Still Working?: Panda is nothing to fear, if you do SEO the right way…

Article Marketing: What Happened and What To Do: This article takes a look at why article marketing with article directories does not work anymore and what the solution is now.

Finally, it should be noted that Matt Cutts, head of Google’s webspam search team, is not terrible fond of article marketing as he states in this YouTube video. However, do note that he is referring primarily to low-quality articles on article directories.

If you subscribe to Richard Cummings (which you should do below), you know that I don’t spend much time promoting this particular site.  I write quality articles and let the SEO value come in over time primarily through natural links.   You can read more about this strategy in the article Ranking Your Name in Google which tells you how to simply move your name to the top in the Google listings.

However, with other sites and competitive terms, you need a healthy dose of SEO to have any chance of being highly ranked in the SERPs.  Among many strategies–including article writing, PR Releases, RSS Feeds, blog commenting, bookmarking, etc–one strategy to use is what many refer to as “community pages”, the two most popular of which are Squidoo and HubPages.

I have used these in the past but not to great extent.  Today, I am reevaluating their value as SEO tools and I bring you my research and conclusions.

SEO, Squidoo, and HubPages: Overview

As I wrote in the article SEO and Golf: They Both Look Easy…Until You Try Them, the premise behind generating well-trafficked pages is simple:

1. Create a well-written page using a few select keywords and ensure that the page has solid on page SEO (OPSEO) with the use of proper titles and tagging.

2. Create inbound links to that page using the few select keywords as anchor text.

So, where do Squidoo and HubPages factor into this? Well, by creating popular pages on Squidoo or HubPages and including links back to your web pages on the same topic, you are adding juice to your web pages, and the best kind of juice at that: inbound, contextual links with the anchor text of your choosing. Both Squidoo and HubPages are very Google friendly because, like WikiPedia, they employ tremendous intra-site linking and achieve a solid PageRank and SERP placement quickly.

The end SEO goal here is to create very solid inbound links to your site, fulfilling step #2 above. If you are so inclined, these sites also allow you to make money off your content. A simple search for Squidoo Earnings displays many people who journal of their Squidoo payoffs.

SEO and Squidoo: The Research

With our SEO goals in mind, let’s have a look at my crack research and see what the pundits out there are saying. Each of the links below opens in a new window:

Squidoo for Traffic – Link Building: In this article, Shell Harris declares: “With Squidoo you get an awesome link building resource where you control the anchor text in the link, where the link points to, where it lives on the page and what is written around it.” Shell concludes that Squidoo is essential in your SEO efforts.

Is Squidoo Good for SEO? Likely More Than You Think!: Obviously, the title on this one says it all. Mark Aaron Murnahan declares “I know very well that Squidoo links are valuable for SEO.” Importantly, he notes that your Squidoo pages–or “lenses” as they are called–must be worthy of a visit on their own and not filled with spammy links to your personal pages.

Squidoo SEO uses: In this article, the author discusses Squidoo SEO uses and does some very interesting tests regarding inbound link building to his Squidoo pages.

Using Squidoo For SEO: This article describes how to use Squidoo for SEO purposes and the SEO benefits that you receive. Ironically, this page is on Ezinearticles and not Squidoo.

As you can see, most of these authors feel that the time spent in building Squidoo pages is worth the SEO effort. Now, let’s see what people are saying about HubPages.

HubPages and SEO

Here are some quality articles on how HubPages can be used in your SEO efforts:

How To Use HubPages Hubs For SEO Link building: In this article, Daniel McGonagle claims “If you’re in need of a quality backlink, you really can’t go wrong with HubPages.com “hubs”.”

Hub Pages – the Center of your SEO Universe: In this article, the author explains exactly how he got a certain term to the top by using inlinks from HubPages.

Why I Do not Use HubPages for SEO: This is an article worth reading. It questions not whether the inbound link is worth it, but whether it is worth the time. You need a certain “score” on HubPages to turn your link into a do-follow link and it may, or may not in this case, be worth the time.

Do Squidoo & HubPages Have A Place In Your Law Firm SEO Campaign?: This article asks about using Squidoo and HubPages for a law firm. But, it begs the questions: Can businesses use these platforms to any avail?

HubPages HubRank Minimum to Avoid NoFollowed Links: This article references how, by creating 30 HubPages in 30 days, someone raised the position of their website in the SERPs and also made money. The author then tried to do it.

SEO, Squidoo, and HubPages: Conclusion

As established, SEO is all about creating quality inbound links to quality content.  The reality is that this takes a lot of time. So, we must ask the question: Is creating a Squidoo page or a HubPage worth the time?

I found it interesting in my research that many of the articles returned in my searches came from sources such as Ezinearticles. As a big fan of using article marketing in your SEO campaigns, this is a telling. And, with article marketing, you simply write an article and do not need to “participate” in a community.

However, the links that come from a quality Squidoo page or HubPage cannot be overlooked.  They are simply the best kind of links:  contextual, do-follow (if done right) links. These are so much better than a comment link or a bookmark link that it is not even worth the discussion.

Thus, my conclusion is this. If you spend a lot of time to create a quality web page, you become an authority on that topic. The time it takes to write another article on the same topic with a slightly different keyword focus (use WordTracker to discover new keywords) is definitely worth your SEO time.

The Mayday Headlines

The “Mayday” moniker for this Google algorithm seems altogether appropriate.  We picture people on a sinking ship yelling “Mayday”.  And there are many people on this proverbial sinking ship.  Witness a few of the latest headlines:

80% Traffic Drop Since Mayday, Less Crawling And Less Indexed Pages

On june 2 our site lost 80% of it’s organic traffic (30.000 visits/day) and till now there is still no improvement noticeable…

43% Of SEOs Say Traffic Down Since Google Redesign

I ran a poll asking you if your Google referrals have changed since the redesign. With over 200 responses, I decided to post the results. In short, over 43% of you said your referrals from Google have declined since the redesign…

Google MAYDAY Update – SERP Changes May 2010

“Think this is the current status: Lost around 25% of power/traffic somehow…I’m in the same boat, traffic dropped 50% in a few days, 100,000′s of long tail k/w…90% of my traffic’s gone!”

The Mayday Update:  What Happened?

As you know, Google frequently updates their algorithm to improve search results.  The Mayday update carries with a significant change for how Google returns search results for “long tail keywords”.

An example of a long-tail keyword would be something like this:  “Apple iPod Touch 32gb 3rd generation review.”

In the past, a page that was optimized for this long tail term might win the battle.  Here is how this would be accomplished:  The SEO optimizer would create a page with that exact name and he or she would sprinkle the long-tail keyword liberally throughout the article (which would probably be filled with non-original content). They would then create several inbound links using this exact long-tail keyword as the anchor text.

The goal with a page like this would be to attract visitors looking for iPod reviews and then have an affiliate link through which the visitor would then buy an iPod.  Ideal Result:  This page would rank above a site with better, more original content and, most importantly, earn money!

The Google Mayday update is designed to prevent someone from easily leveraging a long-tail keyword like this.

Matt Cutts, the man who presides over the Google algorithm updates, spoke frankly about the Mayday changes affecting long-tail keywords saying, “this is an algorithmic change in Google, looking for higher quality sites to surface for long tail queries. It went through vigorous testing and isn’t going to be rolled back.”  For more on Matt Cutts explanation, you can view this Youtube video about the Mayday update:

Want to see the affects of Mayday in action?  Well, let’s take a look at the results of our keyword example:  “Apple iPod Touch 32gb 3rd generation review.”

As you can see, all “above the fold” results (what you see without having to scroll down) are authority websites such as Amazon.com and Cnet.com.

Google Mayday Update:  Is it Fair and Balanced?

As many people are found on the edge of the sinking ship yelling “Mayday”, let’s ask the question:  Is this Google Mayday update fair to the SEO practitioner?  Is Google putting SEO specialists in an untenable position?

Though the Google Mayday update disconcerts many in the SEO circles, it is certainly fair.  In the example above, would you rather see a suspect site with duplicate content about iPods or a great, legitimate site such as Cnet.com?

As an SEO practitioner, you do not want to abandon the idea of long-tail search terms.  You simply want to make sure that the resulting pages are a great match for the searcher with highly relevant and quality information.  And no, your Amazon rip-off product page, no matter how much you “reword it”, is not a worthy of high results.

Google must provide the best results and is doing everything that they can to accomplish this.

The fact is that Google still makes 80% of their revenue from search engine results.  All of the other cool Google stuff-can you say Google Earth?– is funded through the monies generated by their search engine.  If Google ever loses the search engine battle, they will be the ones yelling Mayday!

Why would you want to do this? Well, you might be losing a lot of money and lot of web traffic and not even know it.

A client of mine recently came to me and remarked:

“I recently realized in looking at my web stats that I am getting a lot of people who are looking at my web images from the Google search results. However, I don’t benefit from that at all. They see my image in the Google search results but never get one look at the content of my site. Is there anything that I can do about this?”

In fact, there is something that you can do about this.

Many people out there are losing significant potential income because people are viewing their website images from the Google images results but not actually viewing their website.

There is something that you can do about this and it is very easy to implement. It is a WordPress plugin called Break Out of Frames. This is perhaps one of the easiest plug-ins that you will ever implement that yields the biggest reward.

After implementing the plugin, when people view your image from the Google Image search results, the image page will be redirected to the page containing the image, rather than just the image itself.

After implementing this simple little plugin, the client referenced above had 1000′s of more visits to his website monthly and drastically increased his income.

Occasionally, there are those little things that you can do which yield large results. This is one of them–take advantage of it!

Each of these four have one thing in common: They all run successful websites. Enjoy:

My Review of This SEO Smackdown

A quick review:

This is a well-educated panel and I think what we learn is that there is no “either/or”.

A great website needs both engaging content and solid SEO. Only previously established brands can succeed with little to no SEO.

There was one comment that I disagreed with entirely and it came at the beginning.

In response to the question, “Do you ignore SEO completely or are there some basic SEO techniques that you incorporate in your blogging?”, Dawn somewhat facetiously remarks, “Ignore SEO completely” and goes on to say, “until you have really great content on your blog, all the SEO in the world does not matter.”

I disagree with this statement entirely. It is precisely in the beginning, before you have established your brand, that you want to have outstanding SEO.

All in all though, a highly educated panel with good information for all!

–Richard

Extreme Keyword Competition: Beginner Mistakes

With much excitement, my friend Jim decided he wanted to make a living online. Jim is a driven marketing executive who is fairly computer savvy. His desire to make a living online was spawned by several “feature articles” about people who had succeeded online. Ironically, the very industry that Jim practices–marketing–had lured him in with prospects of online gold.

Jim approached me with his idea. After hearing that you need to find heavily searched for terms and then create inbound, keyword rich links, Jim decided that he would focus his efforts on selling LCD TVs. He would become an Amazon Affiliate and sell hundreds of thousands of LCD TVs.

With great excitement, Jim brought up the Google AdWords Keyword Tool showing me just how many people search for LCD TVs. “Look,” he said with the child-like enthusiasm, “there are millions of searches for this term every month.” We looked at this picture on his screen:

Like many people who are first exposed to the idea of earning money online, Jim saw lots of $$$. What he did not see was the keyword competition!

Examining the Competition

The idea is a good one. Get to the number one spot in Google for a high-paying keyword like LCD TV and make lots of money. As you see in the diagram below, AdWords advertisers pay large sums for the keyword LCD TV.

Beyond advertising, you can also sell LCD TVs directly or through an affiliate program like the Amazon affiliate program. We can reasonably conclude that being #1 for the term LCD in Google will easily be earning you 6 figures EACH MONTH. Thus, this term has massive competition. How much?

Keyword Competition: Free Tools

There are many tools that we can use to determine how much competition that we have for a keyword. I use the tool called SEO Elite because it has everything in one place but there are also good free tools to get the job done. So, for the purposes of this exercise, let’s use the freebies.

My Facebook addicted friends like to joke: “If you’re not on Facebook, then you really don’t exist.” In a similar vein, we can say that if you are not in the top 10 Google results for a keyword, you really don’t exist. In fact, in an insightful article called What is a #1 Google Ranking Worth?, we find that even being in the top 10 might not be sufficient. Based on solid statistical data, the article claims:

A #1 spot is worth 8.5 times what #5 is.

Then how much is #10 really worth?

So, when first evaluating competition, I like to take a good look at the top 10 Google results for a particular term. In my book, the easiest way to do this is with the Keyword Analyzer at a site called IPMANGO.com.

When we put in the term LCD TV, you can see how bleak the situation is in the photo below:

Truthfully, the situation for my friend Jim is not only bleak…it’s impossible. As we can see, none of the pages in question have a page rank below 4. This would take 2 years or more for Jim to obtain. On top of that, the home page for most of these domains have even higher page ranks with hundreds of thousands of in-bound links. (Note: We do see a few anomalies in these results but this is common with with these sort of programs. )

Is This Keyword Simply Too Competitive

I love enthusiasm and certainly did not want to temper Jim’s. At the same time though, I did not want my friend spending years and achieving nothing.

He asked, “Should I give up on the idea of LCD TVs?”

“Not exactly,” I responded, “You need to look for good long-tail keywords if you want to compete in this arena.”

With that, I pointed Jim to the free version of Wordtracker where we find heavily searched long tail keywords (long search terms) that aren’t near as competitive.

Let’s take a look at the term “19 inch lcd tv with dvd”. If you put this in the Keyword Analyzer, you can see that the competition is much less and that you may be able to place within the top 10 on Google for this term because the competition is much less. In fact, I would bet that few of them actually have any in-bound anchor text link using that exact search term.

Keyword Competitive Analysis: Anchor Text

As you can read about in the article entitled SEO: The Seven Deadly Sins, the popularity of your page given a certain search term is not only based on the number and quality of the inbound links, but in great measure on the anchor text used for that inbound link. In fact, there are those in the SEO community who feel that solid anchor text link within incoming links will bring you straight to the top for that keyword or phrase.

But how do you evaluate the anchor text of the competition? Well, if you do not want to purchase SEO Elite, there is a tool I often use that will get the job done for you called the Backlink Watch. Let’s have a look.

Last week, I wrote a post called “Ranking Your Name in Google” which highlights my strategy for getting into the top 10 in Google for my name: Richard Cummings. As I mentioned, I probably would not be able to get to #1 because there happens to be an another important author with my same name. When we use Backlink Watch to view the anchor text for the inbound links to the #1 Google result for Richard Cummings, we see the following:

Do you notice that most of the inbound links use an anchor of Richard Cummings or some variation of that? And, this site has a PageRank of 4.

Thus, achieving #1 for the name Richard Cummings will be a difficult task. However, let’s look at spot #6, a site called RickPhoto. RickPhoto is run by a photographer named Richard, or Rick, Cummings. Rick has a home page ranking of 3, but does not have good on-page SEO…his home page does not even have a title. Using the BackLink Watcher, we can see that he has many incoming links for Richard Cummings Photography but most of them come from just one site. With a little work, RickPhoto would be tough to beat, but right now time is all that it would take.

Keyword Competitive Analysis: Summary

In this article, I have reviewed with you the free technical tools that you can use to determine if you have the ability to compete for a given keyword. Remember, there are simply two tenets to achieve a high-ranking for a specific keyword:

1. Create a well-written page using a few select keywords and ensure that the page has solid on page SEO (OPSEO) with the use of proper titles and tagging.
2. Create inbound links to that page using the few select keywords as anchor text.

If you cannot get to the top ten in Google for your chosen keywords, it is simply a matter of the competition having performed the two steps above for more time than you, resulting in more links with better anchor text from better pages.

Should this discourage you? Absolutely not!

In the short term, you can be successful with long tail keywords.

And in the long term–you have to be involved for the long haul–time will reward you. A few years hence, your keyword competitors will be looking at you thinking…I just can’t compete…

Let me first tell you why I am writing this.

I maintain this website, Richard Cummings, to illustrate my approach to SEO, web consulting, technical training, and project management.  This website is primarily accessed directly by clients to learn of my availability for projects and to read about my approach to the business.

Ironically, though I write a lot about SEO here, I do not spend a substantial amount of time doing SEO for my own website.

However, a client of mine recently wanted to create a personal website and asked, “How can I rank high for my own name in Google? I want people to be able to search for it and come up number one.”

So, I said to him, I will not only tell you how to do it…I will show you.

Thus, I created a plan for both us to reach the first page of Google when people search for our names.

How To Reach the First Page of Google For Your Name

Since I do not actively promote this site, a search for Richard Cummings in Google does not bring up this website in the top 10.  Let’s see…right now…it ranks just about exactly at number 100, the last entry on the 10^th page (if you are showing 10 results per page).

If my name was a non-competitive name, this would not be the case.  In fact, I have friends with unique names who show up number one for their facebook.com or linked-in pages without lifting a finger.

However, I like that my name is a competitive one-it presents an SEO challenge and good chance to illustrate how solid SEO techniques work.

Let’s first take at look at who the competition is for the name Richard Cummings to determine how hard it will be to crack the top 10.  Here is a look at the top 10 entries for my name.

Ok, unfortunately, I seem to share my name with a somewhat famous writer, who appears number one for the name Richard Cummings.  Then, we have a plastic surgeon, a lawyer, several linked-in profiles, and several Google images which show pictures of an aged man who prefers to wear very little clothing.  (It’s fairly easy to get pictures to rank in Google but do I really want to appear next to the half-clothed older man?)

In doing a quick, first-glance analysis of the competition, I think I can crack the top 10 without a problem.  I will probably be able to best the lawyer, and maybe the scientist, but the writer will be a tough nut to crack.  I will tell you why next week when I write about Analyzing the Competition.

So, how will I crack the top 10 and rank for my name?  I will do this using basic, solid, SEO practices.

I already have all of the on-page SEO factors in place and you will notice that I do solid linking within the site for my name.  (This is achieved automatically with the smart links plug-in.)

So, what is left is just one thing, but also the most time-consuming:  Outside pages, ideally with a solid page rank, linking to my site using my name as anchor text.

Initially, I will just use three techniques to do this.

1. Each week, I will publish two of my articles from this site on two article websites, one of which provides a do-follow backlink:  ArticlesBase.com (no-follow links) and eZineArticles.com.  In these articles, I will use Richard Cummings as the anchor text.
2. I will comment on 10 blogs each week and ensure that half of those blogs are “do-follow”.
3. I will submit one to two articles each week to on-topic blog carnivals.

Upon first glance, I believe these three techniques will bring my name to the first page of Google.  I will know more after analyzing the competition next week.

How long will it take to reach the first page of Google?  This is always the first question that people ask.

If someone involved in SEO provides you a short timeframe guarantee, they are either using suspect SEO techniques that will eventually get you banned from Google (read SEO:  The Seven Deadly Sins) or they are outright lying.

I know what works overtime–great content with a healthy amount of inbound links using proper anchor text.

So, how long will it take to crack the top 10 for my name?  My guess is 6 months or less…but I will not provide any guarantees 

I will write about the progress on where my name ranks once a month…subscribe below to be automatically updated.

The Internet is rife with people trying to capitalize on keywords, but there are still diamonds in the rough. I recently wrote an article about creative keywords with some secrets on how to choose and build inbound anchor text links to these creative keywords.

Another way to quickly build lots traffic to your website is more pragmatic, but creative nonetheless.

What are people around the world using everyday at their office? Yes, computers! And, everyday around the world, there are millions of people saying something like this: “This Go**amn computer is driving me crazy. I keep getting an error that says…”.

Boom!

There is your exact keyword!

Think about this: What do you do when you receive an error on your computer? If you are like most people, which I am, you copy that error and place it into the Google search box.

With proper OPSEO, you can quickly jump to the top of the SERPs for this error term. Of course, the newer the error, the better your chances.

Let’s take a look at an example.

SEO and Error Messages: A Recent Example

I maintain this website, Richard Cummings, primarily as a tool for myself, my clients, and those in the field. Since most of my clients are direct referrals, I do not spend time with this site trying to generate top search engine positioning.

However, I occasionally will write a post that I know will get immediate placement in the SERPs and bring lots of visitors. I know this because it usually contains an error message.

Here is the latest example of how an error message generated thousands of visitors. Recently, Amazon Web Services changed some of their specifications and everybody using Amazon Web Services had to quickly adjust their pages and programs. If they did not, they received an error message saying, “The Request Must Contain The Parameter Signature“.

Thus, I created a page called The Request Must Contain The Parameter Signature: Amazon Web Services Error and Quick Solution. Take note: The exact error message is in the title of the document, in the document name, and appears frequently in the document in the heading tags and elsewhere.

This page, without building any inbound links, generated thousands of hits and today is ranked #2 for this error message.

SEO and Error Messages: Conclusion

With few exceptions, it takes considerable keyword research to identify keywords that will generate a lot of traffic. We often need to think outside of the box and come up with creative keywords that will attract visitors.

This idea, however, is not so research intensive. Simply find out what errors people are receiving (preferably newer ones), create a well OPSEO’d page with these keywords, and provide a solution that will work for your visitors.

And voila! You now have thousands of new visitors to your site!

SEO Creative Keywords: Think Like a Searcher

In this memorable scene from the movie Caddyshack, Chevy Chase tells Danny, his golf caddy, “be the ball, Danny, be the ball.” When choosing creative keywords, we need to remember, “be the searcher, be the searcher”.

Consider the article that you are writing. How would someone search for this term when they do their Google search?

There are many obvious choices, but there is one big problem with obvious choices. They are so obvious that you will never be able to place for these terms in the search engines. When you get creative with keywords, you need to go beyond the obvious.

Obvious terms are often the short one or two keyword searches that people will do. Since this blog focuses on technology, let’s consider that you are writing articles about Windows XP. Should you use Windows XP as your primary keyword search term? Obviously not! It might take you 30 years and thousands of pages to even get close to the top of the SERPs for the term Windows XP.

Should you give up your passion and disregard this idea of writing about Windows XP entirely? Absolutely not. This is where you need to exercise your creativity. “Be the ball, Danny, be the ball.”

SEO Creative Keywords: The “I’s” Have It

Since you cannot capitalize on the short tail keyword term Windows XP, you need to find good long tail keyword terms related to Windows XP. As I wrote about in the article Wordtracker vs. Google Keyword Tool, Wordtracker is your best choice to find great long tail keywords.

Using the free version of Wordtracker, we can quickly find several long tail keywords that would immediately generate hits to your site. We just need to “be the ball”.

Think about this. When most people search the web, who are they searching for? Are they doing research for you? No! They are doing research for them. Thus, they often incorporate the word “I” in their searches. We can take advantage of this.

Open the free version of Wordtracker and simply type in “Windows XP I”. This will give you the following top two keyword terms (but there are many more):

These are just two long tail keywords that will deliver you immediate results. How do I know that these keywords will deliver immediate results? Well, I use the paid version of Wordtracker which tells me what the exact competition is for those terms. And I will tell you…with the use of proper OPSEO, you could immediately jump to the top of the search engines using these terms.

How To Use Creative Keywords in Anchor Text

As I wrote in the article SEO and Golf, SEO is comprised of basically two ideas:

1. Create a well-written page using a few select keywords and ensure that the page has solid on page SEO (OPSEO) with the use of proper titles and tagging.
2. Create inbound links to that page using the few select keywords as anchor text.

After you have completed step #1 by writing an article using these creative keywords (with well-employed OPSEO of course), how do you use these long tail keywords in anchor text?

There are many ways to build inbound links to an article. However, some of these methods do not lend themselves to long tail keywords. For example, many people build inbound links by commenting on other’s blog. These comments build inbound links by linking whatever is in the name field to your web page….but you cannot very well put “how do i reformat windows xp” in the name field.

So, how do you build up inbound links for these pages using the long tail keyword as the anchor text? Again, you need to get creative and you will find solutions.

First, remember, you control all links on your site and these links do count for something. When you link to your article, always use this long tail keyword. In fact, since you named your article with the keyword term, simply use an automatic WordPress link plugin and this long tail keyword will be automatically hyperlinked.

Second, when you are linking to your article from the outside in places such as article directories, use phrases like this: Many people ask “how do I reformat Windows XP?” and this article provides the answer. Or, In the article entitled how do i find dns numbers on windows xp, I will teach you how to locate the DNS entries on Windows XP.

SEO Creative Keywords: Conclusion

The market for gaining an audience based on common keywords is super-saturated. You will not build traffic by focusing on common, popular keywords. The competition is too tough and has been there for too long.

However, within these topics, there are great long tail keywords which allow you to build traffic. In this article, we looked at the many long tail keywords available for Windows XP.

Using Wordtracker, you can find many great long tail keywords for all topics.

You simply have to get creative with your keywords and efficiently implement your keyword anchor text links.

“Be the ball, Danny, be the ball!”