Imagine if you will, this common scenario.

A web site builder puts together his site. He is very meticulous about every detail. He’s got the perfect domain name, his H1 tag just so, his anchor text perfect and enough content to choke a horse. He’s gotten himself backlinks from some great sites. His site, after just a few days, is number 3 on Google’s hit parade. He is on top of the world.

And then it happens…the dreaded Google dance, or as I call it, “The Google Shuffle.” Maybe I should write a song about it. But I digress.

Anyway, the Google dance takes place and this site is now nowhere to be found. The site owner is in an absolute panic. So he starts tinkering with the site. He starts slamming it with content, some of it which is not so good, and goes about doing some other things that I won’t mention here because I don’t want to give anybody any bad ideas. He does everything he can to save his site…only to end up making matters worse and getting it sandboxed for life.

If only he had left things alone.

Truth be told, most new sites get a pretty good boost up the rankings the first day or two. This is common. Then, as Google gets a feel for your site, it then settles down to where it should be AT THAT POINT IN TIME. Then, when you’ve settled in, THAT is when you SLOWLY start to work on your site. Maybe add one or two pieces of content a day. Don’t go crazy. And don’t go crazy with getting backlinks either. Too many, too fast is trouble.

But don’t tinker with the structure of the site unless there are really some major things wrong with it, in which case you wouldn’t have hit number three on the hit parade in the first place. Your site, with many flaws, would have been nowhere to be found and you wouldn’t be in a panic in the first place. Well, you’d be in a panic…just a different kind of panic. At least then, you’d have something to panic about.

SEO is a time intensive task. It doesn’t happen overnight and it isn’t permanent. There will always be new sites coming up and trying to take your place in the rankings. Therefore, you will always have to add content and get backlinks. But don’t do it all at once and don’t panic when Google does its dance.

It’s just part of the process.

To YOUR Success,
Steven Wagenheim

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If you have decided to use an external SEO Company and have been provided with the enviable task of sourcing one, here are a few tips on how to go about cutting through the myriad of information, competing providers and charlatans out there in the market and finding the right fit.

The first and most logical approach is to gain an impartial and clear basic understanding of what Search engine optimisation or SEO is all about. One port of call we would recommend is the E-consultancy ‘Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) Best Practice Guide’ which is an excellent resource to gain an understanding of Search engine optimisation (SEO) without the hype, personal opinions and high pressure sales pitch you may find elsewhere. Once you are armed with the facts you will be able to speak knowledgably with potential providers and ask key questions which will help to ensure the SEO partner or provider you choose to work with, will be the right organisation to deliver for you.

The second step is to clarify your goals and objectives for the SEO campaign. It does not matter if the goal is unrealistic as it is the identification of the goal which is important. Many people jump into SEO because they have heard it’s the next best thing, but do not have a clue of what they want and how it fits in with their business strategy. A jack in the box approach is no approach at all and results in a lot of wasted time and resources.

The next step is identifying the financial, technical and human resources available at your deposal. This will impact on the kind of relationship that you would be looking for from an SEO Company. If you have the financial resources and nothing else then look for an SEO that can provide you with a comprehensive solution and take on the accountability for implementation. If on the other hand you have limited financial resources but adequate human resources, then look for an SEO Company that can provide ongoing consultancy and guidance. There can be many combinations but the important thing is to know what will and what will not work for you. Many times companies take on comprehensive SEO contracts and do not have the resources for providing inputs, feedbacks and approvals which ultimately results in an underperforming campaign.

The final step before beating the drums is shortlisting the criteria for inviting an SEO Company to pitch. We have put together a few suggestions based general feedback:

* Search engine optimisation is a time intensive activity requiring varied skill sets that can not be automated making it expensive. If you are in a competitive industry and are looking at perusing aggressive targets it will not come cheap. Anyone offering cheap solutions can not be doing a complete job even if they outsourced.

* Identify companies that have worked and delivered results in your business vertical as it reduces the gestation period of them learning about your business, competitors and market dynamics

* Dig into their breeding about how old is the company, the profile of management and lineage

* Evaluate their own SEO campaign, as any SEO Company worth its money should be ranking well for a handful of keywords and have a well optimisied site.

* Check their accreditation and certificates

Providing that you have been able to carry out all the background work prior to inviting an SEO Company to pitch, the chances of selecting the right agency and making a success of your campaign are significantly increased. The key is clarity and expectations.

Mediarun is a full service SEO Company specialising in performance based Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) solutions, Search Engine Marketing, Social Media Optimisation (SMO) and pay per click management (PPC). We have also pioneered Universal Search and achieved excellent results for our clients on Google Products, Maps and Images.

Implementing the SEO strategies entails a lot of time and hard work. Although there are no shortcuts for many of the steps, some SEO tools can lessen the burden of the webmaster. Many of the SEO tools are available free in the web.

Keyword Tool: Keyword selection is one of the crucial steps in search engine optimization. A good keyword tool is essential to find the profitable keywords to be used in the contents and also for link building services. Google Ad words keyword tool assumes prominence as it is offered free of cost.

Back link Checker: Quality back links are essential to increase the search engine rankings and due to the same reason, it is necessary to find out the back links to the website as well as other competitor sites. A blend of deep links and home page links prove more useful in enhancing the rankings. Link building services can be relied on to obtain quality links. Back link checker tells how many sites are linking to a particular website. The link: URL command in Google and Yahoo site explorer tool are the popular and free options.

Page Rank Checker: Page rank of the page is the rank assigned by Google according to the importance or authority of the page. Links from high PR sites through link building services improve the page rank. Page rank button in Google tool bar shows the PR for every page. Some of the free tools enable bulk searching also.

Indexed Pages Tool: The tool lists the number of pages indexed by the major search engines.
Search Engine Ranking Checker: Checks the position of the site in various search engines for each search term. The automation technique saves much of the time for the SEO professionals in ascertaining the ranking of the website.

Site Map Generator: The tool instantaneously generates the sitemap of various sites. Site map submission to the search engines facilitates easy crawling by the spiders.

Traffic Estimator: This tool is meant to find out the number of visitors to the website during the specific time period. Alexa and Google webmaster tools are the free and trusted tools. Link building services bring a lot of traffic to the websites.

Keyword Density Tool: High and low keyword densities are not favorable to boost the rankings. Keyword density tools helps to maintain it at the optimum level.

Similarity Checker: Search engines ignore and even penalize sites that contain duplicate contents. Similarity checker helps to maintain a unique content in the site.

Meta Tag Generator: Meta descriptions are showed in the search engine results pages. The Meta Generator helps to create keywords and descriptions conforming to the character limits.

URL Rewriting Tool: Static URLs are search engine friendly. The tool creates static looking URL for each dynamic URL.

Incorporating the use of these tools in the design and every day running of your website can result in a top ten listing in Google

Bob D Williams has been involved in the SEO field for over ten years.
Working in various SEO services but specializing in link building services.
And in search engine optimization.

http://www.spike.cc/blog

http://www.googlelinks.net