james's blog

Online video is probably the most powerful marketing tool you'll ever use online.

Perhaps many of you already know that having video on a website produces better conversion rates; but how many of you know, or even thought about the SEO benefits of having video?

Web video is a disruptive technology that is changing the SEO game; Google purchased YouTube for $1.65 billion - is it wise to say that their algorithms have been changed/enhanced for web video? Of course it is.

Before going into the pros and cons of having a forum on a site let's first explain what forums actually are. Most of you are familiar with them but mightn't have heard the term 'forum' before. Well forums are just another name for discussion boards, message boards and other names. They enable users of a website to interact with each other by exchanging tips and discussing hot topics related to a websites theme.

What is a blog? A blog is a website. It has characteristics that are different from a website, but for all intents and purposes that's what it is. Blogs have some unique features which do make them different from websites and we'll cover some of these in more detail.

Easy to Create

Simply put, backlinks are exactly what their name suggests – a link that directs itself back to your website. This could be from another blog or website that you own, or an external link from someone else altogether. Usually a backlink is simply the name of your website and an embedded link that leads straight to your site when someone clicks on it.

Although backlinks offer an invaluable way to promote traffic to your website, you need to make sure that you use them properly. There are many backlink sites on the web that promise you “millions of visitors” to your website – these are usually ones to avoid, as they are more likely than not spamming sites.

One of the very best methods of gaining backlinks is via the blogging community – when you read someone’s blog, you usually have the option to leave a comment. This is where you can leave a link to your website or blog for other people to check out – to really maximize this type of traffic, have your comment offer some kind of tip or advice on the preceding blog post. People reading your comment will think, “Hmm, this person knows what he or she is talking about – I’ll check them out!”

Getting a better ranking in Google Local is always difficult. The main reason is that it continues to be a “black box” that is hard to reverse engineer. It often seems to irrationally rank one business over another.

In a nutshell, they survey a bunch of local search experts on what they think most important factors are. They tally the results, and voila, you have an instant resource on what the true experts believe works and doesn’t work.

Here are their top 20 factors:

It’s estimated that 30 to 40 percent of all searches are made with local intent. However, for certain types of businesses, search almost always has local intent. If you have such a business, it is critical to be found for as many pertinent local searches as possible.

If where you are is important to what you do, then you must maximize your business’s presence in the Local Search results and optimize it for the best performance. People searching for you may be across town or a continent away. Wherever they are and wherever you are, you want them to find you.