My main SEO keyword is 'lose inches'. Would any of you most learned people be so kind as to give me your opinion as to why http://www.squid-cache.org/mail-arch...9912/0005.html is number 2 on Google for this search term?

Thank you

Keyword digger tells you what words you have used ON YOUR PAGE - and how often. It cannot tell you if those are words that people are searching for (you need to research that) or if those are the words that SHOULD be on the page - it simply is taking what you already wrote. It's YOUR responsibility to do the research first - and to put the right words on the page. And it can't tell you how to write your meta or description.

As to the site you asked about - look at the page. The title - starts "Lose 5-15 inches" - the headline on the page starts "Lose 5-15 Inches" - The text on the page says "Lose Inches" "inches loss" numerous times -

For your information - it is a good niche term to work for - but is not one that is widely searched. So, yes, it will give you some traffic - but don't expect a lot from it. While there are over 21,000 searches a day for lose weight (would be very hard to move up with very quickly) there are less than 20 searches for lose inches. So, while I agree with it as a great keyword to work towards - you need to research and have more of these niche keywords.

I think you can quickly move up for this keyword - but you need to do things - like rewrite your page - take the hyphen out of your name in her header - give yourself a headline, etc etc - (yes, the hyphen is part of your name in your url - your url is your address on the net - not how you need your name to appear in a header.

I suggest you read the short ebook in my signature - it's a pdf file and free.

__________________
Beth
A Child's Palace - Pinata Palace - Moxie Enterprises

SEO and Marketing Tools
SEO - The Basics

Ok thank you Bethers. I didn't know that is how it works. I thought the tool was connecting up to the web and checking for typical searches. I was simply following the directions in the tutorial, I didn't know that the search engines would regard what I did as spam. I'm a total newb at this.

Thank you, as far as I am aware I have all these boxes ticked on my main page too - in your opinion have I got that right?

I went for other terms such as 'lose 5 inches' and 'lose inches fast' etc. Does the fact that I have angled towards 'lose inches' cover such search terms as 'lose 5 inches' and other terms which include the words 'lose' and 'inches'? - Or have I got that wrong?

Right, now I'm really confused. As far as I'm aware my page does have a header. I put it in HTML tags <h1>lose-inches.info</h1>, have I done it incorrectly?

Heh, thank you Bethers. I downloaded and read your book yesterday!

Thank you Karen, I've changed my meta tags now. As explained in the post to Bethers I had no idea that I was spamming.

I'm a bit disappointed that you've discovered spelling and grammar errors, as it's an area where I consider myself to be strong. Could you highlight any errors that stand out strongly to you please?

Yep, that's how I understood it. You were being nice, and I was trying to reciprocate! I must have been careless with the phrasing in my post.

OK - I don't call what you have a header - a header is usually a picture - take a look at my sites in my signature - then you have a headline (different thing) that you put at the top in h1 tags. And your name with the - and . after it in h1 tags won't do you any good. I bet there is NO ONE searching for that in that manner.

Now, you say you are also going for lose 5 inches. I said you have to RESEARCH the keywords - if less than 20 people a day are searching for lose inches - what do you want to bet there is no one searching for lose 5 inches? You MUST RESEARCH and find what people really ARE using to search - and THOSE become the phrases for you to target.

Now, you said you "have all these boxes ticked on my main page too" - but no you do NOT. Your title is lose-inches.info - again - not the same as lose inches - both the - and the .info hurt you. You do not have lose inches in your h1 - you have lose-inches.info - which is NOT what people are searching for. (The search engines will not separate out those words - lose-inches.info is all one word unlike lose inches which is two wrods. Again, just because you have the - in your url - it IS NOT how people are searching - and will not work in your title or h1. And a header and a headline are different.

__________________
Beth
A Child's Palace - Pinata Palace - Moxie Enterprises

SEO and Marketing Tools
SEO - The Basics

Thank you Beth, check all that, relevant changes made. Would you please have a quick look and let me know if I'm on the right track?

For clarification: As a header is usually a picture, SE's presumably cannot read them. So the only factor that denotes that the picture is a header is the fact that it is at the top of the page. Are there special HTML tags that show it is a header? Does the fact that it is at the top of the page mean that Google spiders are more likely to read the alt text and place more importance on it?

Well actually Beth I have done a fair amount of research on keywords. I signed up for Google Adwords about five weeks ago, and I used the Google keyword suggestion tool to create a large list of keywords, based on relevance, popularity and competition (or rather lack of it). I am monitoring the impressions ongoing. Do you think this is a good way of researching?

Thank you for your help.

Google Adwords is not where you research for your keywords that you want to have happen in organic search. They are giving you lesser used keywords that you can afford (therefore usually the lack of competition and also often very few people searching for it). Now, they pick relevance based on WHAT YOU HAVE ALREADY ON YOUR SITE. So they are assuming YOU already did the research to find the correct words.

Now, you've done a good job with your h1 - much better for visitors and for se's. Yes, the header, if a picture, isn't read by the search engines - but you put an alt tag on it that is - which can simply be your same words you have on it. What you've done by adding the header and using the correct h1 headline - is given your site the professionalism you want and need to get sales.

One place you could do research without cost is http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion/ - you do not have to put the code they have on the website - just use the tool to find the keywords to use on the website.

Also - if you're using PPC - make sure you're using it very carefully if you're new to this. Make sure from the beginning that it's generating more income than you're spending on the words. You can quickly go broke with PPC if not done correctly - even on those fringe words. Your ROI has to be worthwhile.

And use the tool I just gave you to see what kind of people are searching for the phrases you got from Google. Remember - they simply took the phrases from YOUR pages to get relevant phrases.

__________________
Beth
A Child's Palace - Pinata Palace - Moxie Enterprises

SEO and Marketing Tools
SEO - The Basics

Thank you Beth. The keywords I am using in Adwords are not generated by my site content - that's an option when to generate keywords, I didn't opt for it. - My keywords are generated from my own original input. You're right, I'm losing money on it, but it's only coppers, and I thought it was worth the loss to get the research answers.

I will use the tool in the link you gave and report back!

I appear to have fallen at the first hurdle. Top ranking result for 'lose inches' is 'diet fast inch lose loser no'. Surely that can't be right? Am I doing something wrong?

I don't know what happened - but that is O*****re - unfortunately, it didn't give results for the other company - which I prefer. Here's another one to use:
www.keyworddiscovery.com - it has a free version - and I like www.wordtracker.com also - but you need to pay for their results now - you can purchase a days worth of time - and just go crazy. Keyword discovery has a paid version that can give very neat things also - but just try it's free version for now - as it is giving good results.

__________________
Beth
A Child's Palace - Pinata Palace - Moxie Enterprises

SEO and Marketing Tools
SEO - The Basics

Thank you Bethers.
The keyworddiscovery.com keyword tool is giving results that I get from most other keyword tools: if I ask it to search for 'lose weight' using the US database, every term in its results has 'weight LOSS' - none of them have 'lose' in the term. Why is that? Is it something I'm doing wrong?

Wordtracker.
This is the first tool I've used that appears to be doing what I want it to do. It makes keyword suggestions based on real historic searches, you then choose the keywords that you deem to be most appropriate to your site, and then it gives your chosen keywords a rating, based on the number of searches for that keyword in the last 90 days, against the number of pages competing for the word.

The better the rating, the better the keyword - unless of course the number of searches is so low that it wouldn't have any effct on your site's traffic.

Thank you Beth!

You're welcome - these tools are only as good as those of us using them - and finding the right one for what we need. I believe Wordtracker is one of the very good ones. I don't always tell people to use it- because most people on these forums are trying to find what they can do for free. As you see - paying can have it's benefits.

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Beth
A Child's Palace - Pinata Palace - Moxie Enterprises

SEO and Marketing Tools
SEO - The Basics

..........erm, it is free! There is a super-dooper version that you pay for, but the free version is more than adequate for me.

Just checked Wordtracker, you can get the sooper-dooper version for a week's unbridled abuse at a cost of $28/£14, which is very tempting. I shall report back!

Right, that's what I meant. I pay a couple times a year - and then spend hours playing in there :)

I like your phrasing "unbridled abuse" - very apropros.

__________________
Beth
A Child's Palace - Pinata Palace - Moxie Enterprises

SEO and Marketing Tools
SEO - The Basics

AJ,

Try this link to google keyword tool and you will have an idea after you have tested your keyword using the tool.

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

That tool, while useful, does not give the information necessary as to what words people are actually using to search - in a concise manner - to help design pages.

__________________
Beth
A Child's Palace - Pinata Palace - Moxie Enterprises

SEO and Marketing Tools
SEO - The Basics

Hmmm I need to look at it again then, Beth. I thought the one thing the Google tool did do was make suggestions based on genuine historical searches.

What it definitely doesn't do is give specific stats on the volume of the searches and the extent of the competition. It just uses little bar graphs with no legend, which tells you precisely 5 eighths of **** all.

The last part of what you said - exactly lol - and some of those terms might be genuine searches by one person - of no use. But that graph doesn't say that. I use that for my sites - and 99% of what they recommend, I toss - as they would not be targetted phrases for what I have.

So, use everything offered, but be very careful - YOU know what your site is about - none of the services do. Say I ask Google about the word pinata - one of the top phrases is probably going to be history of pinatas - not going to bring me any buyers - and I do have a page on that - but would never use it for PPC - and wouldn't optimize anything but the one page for it (just on the chance that I'll get someone occasionally who finds me that way and does buy). Most of the phrases they recommend - would not be ones I'd even optimize a page for like that.

__________________
Beth
A Child's Palace - Pinata Palace - Moxie Enterprises

SEO and Marketing Tools
SEO - The Basics

OK, so Wordtracker and I have spent the last seven days getting to know each other, and over a short period of time we have developed an intimate relationship. Before I continue to giive my appraisal of Wordtracker as promised, I have a question for all you SEO gurus:

Much of my research consistently unearths someone who says that your website should be optimised with respect to the competition because it is those specific websites that you are competing with.

I'm not entirely sure what these people are on about. To my way of thinking, your competitors are the top ten sites returned by Google for any given search term. Doesn't matter whether those sites are in the top ten intentionally or by accident, the fact is that your site has to replace one of them in order to get high volume traffic.

Is my logic flawed here? Have I gone awry with my reasoning? Please enlighten me!

Google/Yahoo/MSN they're all the same to me at this stage my development. If I can get any page of any site onto the first page of results for any of the three 'big' SE's I'll view that as progress - providing the keyword has some reasonable known volume for searches.

The reason I asked the question is this: Wordtracker's default settings for their competition search has the quote option set to 'yes'. Now I know that - in theory - this will produce more relevant results, but as far as I can see, relevance is irrelevant. Most people search without quotes, and when they do, the first page of results will determine which site they choose to visit. Of course, at that point they will choose the most likely-looking site for their needs, but they are not thinking about relevance at the time that they make the initial input into Google, because they do not use quotes.

I know that some of the results on the first page will be irrelevant to the searcher's intentions, but nevertheless, because most people search without quotes, that initial first page of results will show you your competion, whether those sites are optimised for the keyword by design or by accident.

Similarly, many SEO 'experts' advocate the use of the allintitle function on Google. How is that going to help you? It will you tell you how many pages and exactly which pages have your chosen search terms in their title. All well and good, but I don't understand what use that data would be.

Allintitle

This is a special search term you can use with Google to help you seek out your competitors for a keyword. You use it like this, Allintitle:keyword(s)

This search displays all websites with the keyword(s) included in the title, and thus gives you an idea of how many sites - and exactly which sites - are deliberately competing for your keyword.

You can go one step further by putting your keyword in quotes like this Allintitle:"keyword phrase" which will return all sites with the exact keyword phrase in their title, thus narrowing down the results to your exact competition.

You can then visit each of these sites - especially the top ranking ones - and view their HTML code, thus enabling you to examine the optimisation methods they have used.

Many so-called experts advocate the use of the Allintitle function, but my own view is that the Allintitle function has limited - if any - use because the real competition is in the first ten results returned from a normal search.

Even if some of those sites in the first ten are not really relevant to the keyword, the fact that they are in the top ten means that they are stopping your site from being there.

So does anyone have any views on this? Did I miss something cool with the Allintitle function? Or is it as limited as I think it is?

I am going to answer your question as to why I beleive that page is so highly ranked and I am sure that 100 people will gladly tell me how wrong I am but here goes. Google and other search engines will keep in mind that people like to see comment in different format for example html, php, cfm, and so on they also know that different encoding is importent for different viewers utf-8, charset, etc. So within its top results it will try to include the best pages with these different variables. Seeing how this page is a saved mail archive well written in a simple to read format. It stands to reason why it is in the top ten. Google doesn't care who is trying to sell what but who has the most relevant information on there page about the terms that are searched. This page has those terms spaced throughout the page. This page uses no keyword tags. Google doesn't even read your keyword tags and it is recommended to use no more than 7 keywords per page. Another reason the page is so higly ranked is because it has been around for a while. I hope my opionion helps.

I am not a expert nor do I beleive anyone outside of google is for your question.

Good luck

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Never Let a Kind word go Un said!

Soy Candles

Garren, thank you for the input, which page are you talking about?

Sorry, I realise now you are referring to my original quetion in the OP.

Well, if your theories are correct they would certainly go a long way towards answering my question, thank you for your insight!

You don't think that inbound links play any part in the page's ranking?

The page in question has no inbound links except the ones you are creating for it in this forum. It's pagerank is based on the amount of time it has been around the internet. To answer your question to me though I do beleive inbound linking is important for page rank for two reasons.
1. I have seen it with my own eyes.
2. Google tells you it is important.

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Never Let a Kind word go Un said!

Soy Candles

Yes, exactly why I asked the question in the OP Garren. There are no inbound links and yet the site still makes it to no 2.

I think you have made some excellent points, they give a plausible explanation for the site's position. If your explanations are correct it gives us all something to think about i.e. inbound links perhaps aren't always as important as conventional wisdom would have you think.

Here's another one for you Garren (or anyone else for that matter). The search term diverticulitis diet returns the site www.diverticulitis.net at number 6 on Google.

My question is similar to the OP, with no inbound links to the site, why do think that happens in this case?

That page isn't at no6 its diverticulitisdiet. One reason that apge is there is its not a very competitive search term. Its name is the same as the search term all internal links have part of search term in there links. Small page size. Type of page and encoding. Proper use of h1 h2 tags. Proper placement of keywords. My opionion of course.

You will go crazy trying to figure out why and how google does what it does I wouldn't go down that path. It will just make you go mad and crazy trust me I've been there

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Never Let a Kind word go Un said!

Soy Candles

Yes, sorry Garren of course I meant www.diverticulitisdiet.net . Thank you for your reply, you are very knowledgable on this subject, and furthermore you confirmed what I thought were the answers to my questions.

I'm not really trying to work out why and how Google does what it does, ultimately I'm aware that Google's formulae and algorithms are essentially unknown by anyone other than Google themselves and so there is only so much work that you can do in this area.

Nevertheless I am keen to learn the basics, I am just trying to place myself in the ballpark at this point in terms of Google knowledge.

On what specifically are you basing your opinion that it is 'not a very competitive search term' ?

Well, nearly a year down the line I just thought I'd come back and say I am well on my way. If you put lose inches into msn.com, guess who is at no 2, and if you put it into yahoo.com, guess who is at number 2 AND 5?

Just the big G to crack now, currently outside the top 100, but I'll get there!