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With so many intricacies involved with the art of search engine optimization, it can be easy to miss something as simple as proper anchor text usage. However, this simple practice could cost your site pages in the SERPs, so pay close attention to the following information.

What is Anchor Text?

In basic terms, the anchor text is the visible text that is displayed in a hyperlink. Anchor text is used to make links more appealing to the eye, as lengthy links are generally ugly and intimidating to the average web user. To make a link more “clickable” webmasters use anchor text to describe the content of the links location. For example, if I post a link to a site about website marketing then I would want the anchor text to reflect that topic. Aside from the way a human visitor responds to an anchor text, search engine crawlers also use anchor text to determine backlink relevancy, which has a great impact on a site’s ranking.

How Does Anchor Text Affect Search Engine Ranking?

When a search engine crawlers indexes a site it collects all of the information it encounters, including links. In many cases, if the link is a dofollow link, the search engine crawler will even click that link and index the link location as well. In every case, the crawler will index the anchor text of the link. The anchor text gives the search engine a good idea of the content of the link’s location. So when you’re building links, it is always best to use your targeted keywords in the anchor text of the links you distribute.

Looking for a quick fix that will improve your rankings? Take a look at your title tags. A title tag is the line of text that is normally displayed at the top of the browser window.  Title tags are arguably the most important SEO tags for any site.

For most search engines, the maximum length of a title tag to be displayed is between 60-70 characters. If your title tag is over 70 characters, your title will be cut off around 70 characters on the search results page.

Search engine spiders use these title tags as the main source for determining the page topic. Spiders or crawlers examine the title and then translate the topic of the page. This is one reason why it is always best to use your keywords in the page title, and to place them as close to the beginning of the title as possible. Remember, the text included in the title tag is also the text that will appear in the SERPs (search engine results pages) as the linked title on which users will click to access your page. In fact, just fixing the title tags of your pages can often generate quick and significant improvements in your rankings.

For example, let’s say you have an educational site that provides information and guidelines on teacher certification requirements.  You’ve decided that the most important keywords for your site are “teaching certification” and “teaching requirements.” In this case, a page title along the lines of “Teaching Requirements for Teacher Certification” is highly relevant to the topic of the site. Spiders will crawl your site, and because the title is the first factor it sees, the spider will “read” it and then examine the rest of the page finding the keywords used in other places on the page to determine how relevant the title is to the rest of the content. If the content, H tags, and title tag all relate—you’re in business! This is why it’s so important to target the most critical keywords in the title tag.

Follow this same process for all of your pages, and remember to create unique titles that are relevant to each page and do not  keywords stuff.  This greatly improves the effectiveness of those tags and will increase the search engine rankings for your keywords. Although your home page might show up for 20 or 30 different keyword combinations, only your top two or three keyword phrases should be included in the tittle.

Believe it or not, all SEO’s were newbies at one time or another. Launching a website can be a very exciting event for an individual or new business owner. However, that excitement can quickly turn to disappointment when the site owner finds out that they are getting little or no traffic. If they are getting traffic, it is most likely coming from family members or friends who they notified through an email or  Facebook.

A natural link building campaign is one that is just that, natural! Getting 50,000 links within the first twenty days of your website’s existence is definitely not natural. Getting a slow trickle of links coming into your website and then building up looks much more natural. Also, getting 50,000 links pointing to your home page with the same anchor text is not natural. Vary your anchor text and include long tail versions of your keywords. You should also build links to other pages of your site in addition to your home page. All of these things help with building a natural link campaign.

In terms of links, there are two types of links you can get for your websites, external and internal links. Both are very important and can make a huge difference in your search engine rankings. I want to discuss in detail, ten ways to effectively jump-start your link building campaign.

Friends & Family Members

When beginning a link building campaign, one very natural way of obtaining links is from friends and family members. How hard is it to simply call up (recommended – it’s more personal) or email your family and friends who have blogs or other sites, and ask them for a link to your new website? Not hard at all! In fact, because they are your friends or family members, they will probably do it without hesitation. You can do the same thing with Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc.

Add A Blog To Your Domain

Google loves blogs! Google loves fresh content! Google loves internal links! Internal links from other pages of your website are a guaranteed way to help you increase your rankings in the search engines. Adding a blog to your domain is a great way for you to easily add new content to your website on a regular basis. In most cases, adding a blog to your main domain is rather simple and can be done in as little as three clicks of your mouse. Web hosting companies like myhosting.com, Hostmonster, & Bluehost offer one click installations of blog platforms like  Wordpress or b2evolution.

Adding a blog, posting to it at least once daily, and linking back to your home page and other important pages of your website with keyword anchor text is a great way to gain a lot of internal links. When blogging, you should also link out to other websites that interest you and websites that are in similar industries. You might also consider adding images, videos, polls, etc. Mix things up! Make it look natural! Most important, have fun!

Local Organizations

Just about every city in the country has a local chamber of commerce; mine would be the Lehi Area Chamber of Commerce. Joining a chamber of commerce will not only get you a very good link back to your website, but also provides networking opportunities with other local businesses. Most times, depending on your business, you can generate new leads rather easily by getting to know other individuals and businesses in your area.

Local News

Developing relationships with local newspaper writers and always making yourself available for comments on news stories that involve your industry is a great way to build awareness about your company and get links back to your website (if the newspaper is published online).

Help A Non Profit Organization

You would be surprised how many non-profit organizations are operating in your city and your state. Every one of us has been given talents and certain things that we are good at. I guarantee that there is a non-profit organization that could use your help, whether it is with designing their website or painting the conference room of their new office building. If you offer of yourself and your services freely, you can most likely ask for, and get a link to your website from theirs.

Submit Your Site To Local & Industry Specific Online Business Directories

Anyone studying SEO can usually find a blog post about submitting your website to directories on the Internet. Yes, this is a valuable link building tactic, but before you go crazy and start submitting to thousands of directories, seek out local directories and directories that are specific to your business. Submit to these first and take your time filling out all of the information that they ask for. These will be some of your most valuable links since they are so relevant to your website and business.

Social Bookmarking

You have probably heard the term social bookmarking. You have probably heard that social bookmarking is a great way to build links. Well, it is and it isn’t… You can waste a lot of time social bookmarking if you are submitting to the wrong sites.  The trick to social bookmarking is to not only bookmark your website, your blog posts, and other things related to your website, but bookmarking lots of different things that interest you. This will make your bookmarking profiles look much more natural to both viewers and the search engines.

Write An Article And Submit To Article Directories

Writing articles and submitting them to sites like Ezine articles; Article City; and Go articles, also known as article marketing, is a great way to get links back to your website. Take time to write a very detailed article about your industry and submit it to a few article directories like the ones I listed above. You will get links back to your website by properly using the author resource or bio box at the end of the article. You should tell a little about yourself and your company, while adding keyword rich anchor text links pointing back to your website.

Write And Submit A Press Release

Writing press releases and submitting them to places like PR Web or Web wire is a great way to generate interest and buzz about your business and also to get links back to your website. This method of link building is a little more difficult than other links that you can get for your website. Writing a press release takes skill… a skill, which the average person, like me, does not have. Press releases have certain requirements that must be met, a certain format that must be followed, and in most cases, need to be super interesting. Not having any of these elements can almost guarantee that your press release will either be outright rejected or not distributed to other news related websites.

Build A Hub Page Or Squidoo Lens

Building a  Hub Page or squido lens is  a fun way to get links back to your website. To date, I have built 73 Hubs and 25 Lenses for my own personal websites and hundreds for clients that I have managed. The most effective Hub Pages and Squidoo Lenses are those that have at least 450 words of text about a certain topic or subject, videos, pictures, polls, and other gadgets that are easy to add. You want to make the page as interactive as possible so it provides value for anyone who happens to read it. You are allowed two links to other websites from your Hubs and a handful of links (be conservative, don’t spam) from your Lenses.

Building links isn’t pretty. But, in order to rank well in the search engines, it is absolutely necessary. These are ten excellent ways for new companies or new website owners to start building links to their websites.

If you have a business today, it is most likely that you have a website. This website that you have created is in effect is like having outside your office a billboard. The whole purpose for a website is to cause your business to be seen, the services and/or goods that you offer, however, you, in order, for you to get the business you need traffic. The best way to attain website traffic is through SEO services. Some may ask, though, does search engine optimization really improve traffic to a website?

It is important that you understand the impact of managing a company in the virtual world. Here are the main keys to being successful business online:

1.Increase website traffic.
2.Increase the time that a user spends on the site.
3.Improve visitor to sales conversion rates.

In the virtual world, search engine optimization had progressed. SEO observes how algorithms work and what people typically look for. To have an effective website or a blog it must include SEO-rich content that appears first in the search results so that that when users are seeking information on the search engines your website can be found. Through the help of SEO services you can work your way to developing an online business that is successful by ensuring that you have SEO- rich content in your blogs and websites that are relevant and updated on a regular basis.

Using search engine optimization can be great tool for marketing, which can promote your business, in addition, to promoting your services and products. This is especially the case for small to medium business owners. Users online who are searching for information, websites and blogs that are informative serve two purposes. Not only do they attract users by offering information that is relevant, but they then lead them to the goods and services they have to offer.

Too many people think that getting traffic to their website is done after the website is built. They fail to realize that on-site optimization for good search engine ranking is built into their website – not added on. When a website is built by a company that does not offer search friendly composition, the task for optimizing this website is often like re-designing the whole site. I know well about this, as half of my clients, usually with a new website, come to me for SEO (search engine optimization).

When you build a website, is it not intended to get visitors? Do you want Google, Yahoo, and Bing to know you exist? Wouldn’t it be nice to be on the first page for search terms related to your website? … and finally … Do you want to pay twice to get this accomplished?

That’s what too many people are doing. They are uninformed. They select a web design company that does only that, with little or no reguard for search engines. Then, once their site is fully developed, they seek out a company that can turn their content into SEO content. So why not do this when building the website?

… because you were not informed.

You didn’t realize that there are web designers that also optimize your content for search engines. They utilize the required markup for optimal search, and adjust styling to blend with your design. They utilize meta data, a markup language seen only by viewing page source, to assist search engines to find and index your website.

SEO web designers also employ desk-top SEO software, just like the big-time SEO/SEM companies. WIth this software, your SEO web designer will find not only relative keywords, but will also find which keywords that you’ll have a fair chance with. And the SEO software goes even deeper by analyzing all your competitor’s websites.

Yes, it is possible to not only get great web design, but also to get your website on first page Google with an SEO web designer. Avoid all the confusion. Avoid paying twice to get your message out. Next time you need a website, get someone who designs and optimizes. Hire an SEO web designer.

… but there’s more to it.

You don’t want to get a “cookie cutter” website – one made with pre-programmed styles. You don’t want to hire a high-production web design company, one that has sales quotas to meet, rushing to just get the job done.

You don’t want “black hat SEO” tactics used – that will get you banned from Google. You don’t want a novice SEO programmer, one that doesn’t keep up with search engine trends. And you don’t want — or cannot afford — the $3.00 to $8.00 per day 6-month contract that most SEO outfits charge. There actually are SEO experts who can perform a one-time-service to get you on Google first page – and your position will be secure.

Avoid all the confusion. Avoid paying twice to get your message out. Next time you need a website, hire an interdependent freelancer  who designs and optimizes your website . Hire a SEO web designer.