How do you know if your SEO is working? Here are five stages outlined
below to give you a better idea and measure the results.
It doesn't matter if you call it Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Search
Engine Marketing (SEM) or any other fancy acronym, what matters are
results. Fortunately results are quantitative and measurable so you can
deduce which tactics are effective and which are a waste of
time.Relevance is a moving target, it is completely molded by the
individual referencing the query, which means that positioning relies a
great deal on your ability to read the market and forecast trends and
buzzwords with traffic attached. Aside from picking keywords, writing
content and building links, you need to know which guideposts to assess
to determine if your optimization is falling on deaf ears or in fact
pulling its own weight.
The bottom line, how do you know your SEO is working?
Stage 1 Post relevance "Exact Match": Rankings make their debut.
In this stage, your site goes from unknown and starts creeping up in
various "exact match" searches for very specific keywords. This is the
foundation that denotes that you have in fact done something right to
qualify your content for consideration and may "if managed properly"
elevate your pages for competitive placement in the future as things
settle in.
Stage 2 Search engine result page leverage "The Double Listing": More
than one page appears in the rankings for a search.
The next stage when a double listing is returned in search engines for a
particular query indicates that the topical theme of your content has
more than one page in available as a relevant result. There is something
visually stunning about seeing this phenomenon, not to mention you can
increase conversion by 200%.
This can also be toggled through using similar title tags or linking two
or more pages together with anchor text / keywords that support the main
keywords in the title.
Stage 3 Site Wide Relevance "Keyword Stemming":
This stage occurs after the initial pages have had a chance to ferment
and age and the links and collective link weight of the site start to
make their presence known. As page rank becomes more buoyant and starts
to move up and throughout the site it finds pages to pool itself for
expression (based on link popularity, user engagement). As a result, the
page or related pages may start to appear for "broad match" search terms
in addition to the more standard narrow search results it was originally
intended for.
Instead of appearing in a search result for (keyword) consulting, your
site also appears for consultant, service and services, company or
companies. The next step is when semantic correlations also make their
debut and you start ranking for any variation of the main keywords and
modifiers. More on that in the last stage (authority).
Stage 4 The Long Tail Dominates and any keyword can become a returned
search result:
This is referred to as unintentional optimization and is usually a
matter of off page link building and which terms are in the anchor text
pointing at the page. You can easily create this affect by varying your
anchor text and linking to specific pages in your site with semantically
related keywords in the links. Then they look for on page relevance and
the continuity of on page and off page factors produce this effect.
The long-tail of search simply implies broad search terms combined to
zero in on relevance instead of a general less specific search. For
example 2001 Suzuki TL 1000R for Sale in "my town and state" for example
is a long tail search vs. "buy motorcycle" which is a general search query.
The flip side of relevance is, no matter what, there is always someone
looking for something, so this can be a pivotal strategy for conversion
if wielded properly. Would you rather have 10,000 searches a month from
the long tail or 1000 for your main keywords, ideally both together are
the goal.
Stage 5 Website Authority – Ranks on its own accord and reinforces
itself: A mention of a keyword is enough to create a top 10 ranking.
This is the goal of SEO, website authority, authority goes a long way
and can do wonders for traffic, engagement and sales. Authority sites
are just sites people enjoy frequenting due to the exchange or
fulfillment they receive from the transaction. Not to mention, at this
point, other authority sites link to you and vice versa, the old birds
of a feather thing.
Example of an authority site, CNN, Oprah, ESPN, you get the drift. Focus
on quality and people link to you, when your still trying to figure out
ways to get links, go back to basics and shore up your own content and
create a worthy resource worth linking to. Then you become less
dependent on others for your rankings and can weather the storm if your
pages fall out of favor with algorithms due to off page links losing
their impact.
--
my motto is "Keep it simple" and "don't leave anything for tomorrow that
can be done today."
If you have any questions or comments please contact me.
Regards Gerald
Website: http://www.webcraft.ws
E-mail: gerald@webcraft.ws
Twitter: WebcraftGuru
Facebook: Webcraft Guru
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