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External links to and from your site

February 12, 2016 by Peter Mahoney

External links to and from your site Wordpress SEO & AI Search (GEO) Expert

A leaking glass more than half-full

Links pointing in to your site are really important for SEO. Google has started suggesting they may be less and less important, and give it 5-7 years I think they’ll be one of the lesser important SEO criteria (in favour of RankBrain and Artificial Intelligence tools that can really determine how quality the site and it’s contents are.). But for now, external links from other sites are still important.

But, well, let’s think of links in and out like a glass of water being filled up and poured out.

  • For each link pointing to your site, lets fill up the glass a little. As it gets fuller it gets more SEO authority, which is great.
  • But for each link out, we can empty the glass a bit too.

So if for every link you have in you also have one out, the glass actually ends up empty*.

People used to make sites called “link traps” that didn’t link externally to anything, trying to full their glass right up. But as you’d expect Google got wise to this technique, and started to penalise sites if they did this—it’s contrary to the idea of a well-formed world wide web, and Google wants to help steer the web to be as useful as possible.

So it’s important to have some links out. I usually recommend a ratio of 4/1 – for every four links in, have one link out. That does vary based on a couple of factors, but it’s a good rule of thumb.

The glass fills faster than it empties, so Google is happy, and we are too.

* – important note, this is a very simplistic metaphor. Not all links are created equal, so if you have a link to your site from the BBC homepage, and a link out to your friend’s Etsy shop, you’d still end up with more water in the glass because in that case the link in has more SEO authority than the page you’re linking to. But because most sites aren’t in that position (most sites will have links in and out from sites swimming with them in a similar depth in the pool of link-juice; but I’ve used enough liquid-based similes for one day), it’s still a useful analogy.

Filed Under: Google, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

3 Approaches to PPC Advertising

December 31, 2015 by Peter Mahoney

I don’t actually offer PPC advertising services (Pay per click). I’m very specialised at what I do already, but clients do regularly ask me for advice garnered from 18 years experience across a variety of technologies.

So I do have some thoughts to share with you.

One very effective technique with PPC is to target what is known as a “spread” of search queries and phrases. That’s based on making the most of the three different “tracks” people take when planning PPC campaigns.

  1. Many people make the mistake of just targeting the most popular searches, which of course is a valid technique but places them firmly, exclusively, in a very competitive market. It also costs a lot more to run campaigns of this nature.
  2. Conversely some people will try to do the opposite, target only the less common searches to save themselves money spent on the campaign, but of course they see a lot less traffic.
  3. There is a third-road, which is trying to find searches with a statistically slightly higher popularity, but lower competition. However, the vast nature of Google Adwords and other PPC markets tends to even these “gaps” out pretty quickly, so even when they can be found the gap is very narrow.

I prefer to approach these campaigns as a spread, to include some targets from all three of these categories. That way you achieve a good mix of results, financial outlay, and it gives you greater scope to track the success of your campaigns and decide which of these might be worth higher future investment.

Basically, you get more options, more data and therefore in the long run a much more strategic and lucrative approach.

Filed Under: Google, Hints & Tips

Google’s RankBrain and SEO

October 27, 2015 by Peter Mahoney

Google has a new update for us. Called “RankBrain”, in its most basic sense it’s an attempt by Google to run AI (Artificial Intelligence) as a way of working out how useful a site is to any given query.

One example Google has given for how it affects things, is this search query:

What’s the title of the consumer at the highest level of a food chain

Obviously that’s not the most well structured question, but a lot of searches aren’t that carefully thought out.

The point of the example is the word “consumer”. In different contexts it can mean different things, and RankBrain is intended to help match searches with the most relevant results; understanding the context.

It doesn’t have a huge effect on how I would structure a site and its contents for SEO though—fortunately because my advice for SEO has always fit in very nicely with Google’s overall ethos, changes to their algorithm usually strengthen my clients’ SEO.

But it is worth being aware that Google is definitively not just “pattern matching”; counting keywords in your content. They’re trying to read it like a human being would—so keep writing for a human audience when you’re adding content.

Filed Under: Google, Keywords, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Google confirms more searches are performed on mobile devices than desktop computers

May 6, 2015 by Peter Mahoney

For those of us who track this sort of thing, this comes as no surprise. But it’s worth knowing it’s now official – Google has confirmed that more searches are performed on mobile phones and tablets than traditional PCs/laptops.

It makes their last major update well timed – just a couple of weeks ago they made sure mobile friendly sites would have priority in mobile-based search results over sites that are not.

But this does mean if your site isn’t mobile friendly, we have the stats to hand that show you ARE missing out of search engine potential. Contact me and I can help.

Filed Under: Google, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Get mobile friendly

February 12, 2015 by Peter Mahoney

Google has been sending out millions of these messages over the past couple of months.

Google systems have tested 177 pages from your site and found that 32% of them have critical mobile usability errors.

Google Webmaster Tools has long pointed out the important of having a mobile friendly site–but now Google is taking it seriously. When you’re looking at search results on a smart phone (which accounts for a huge percentage of people) you’ll see a little notification if a site is mobile friendly. Funnily enough, those sites will be getting most of the organic traffic.

There has never been a better time to get a mobile friendly, responsive website.

All the sites I build are responsive, and you’re welcome to ask for my help.

Filed Under: Google, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Google to prioritise HTTPS (secure) websites

August 7, 2014 by Peter Mahoney

I’ll add my own comment on this soon, but for the sake of getting information out in a timely fashion, here is a poorly written article.

Google to prioritise secure websites

🙂

Seriously, despite the way the articles is written, this could be very big news for the world wide web. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon. Most likely soon. Maybe six months.

Filed Under: Google, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

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