RSS for SEO

It's really simple syndication but it really seems to scare people away! An RSS file is just an XML file available for copying.



RSS is an integral part of Search Engine Marketing these days and it is imperative that you have feeds from your website or content you've created for web 2.0 properties.

RSS allows others out there, good and bad, to grab your content for their own purposes.

RSS allows and encourages and some advanced techniques for viral spread, so it is imperative that you have links back to your money pages in the first sentence or two of the RSS feed as this is often the only part of the feed displayed.

More importantly RSS allows you to create new web 2.0 properties, and therefore new authority links! without having to rewrite and redistribute the content each time it changes, and without incurring Google duplicate content penalties!

More about how to really take advantage of RSS in the mewmbers section soon!



Beat The System

Matt Cutts talks about indexing pages and links

Matt Cutts Googles self appointed mouthpiece talks about the necessity of links in getting new content indexed.



What can you learn from this?

Get as many links as you can from authority sites that are spidered very frequently.
Court sites that Google loves!
Create Buzz around your new page by blogging etc!

TIP - check the google cache page for your website to see when it was last spidered

Banned from Google?

Have you ever had your site removed from the Google Index for being naughty?

We have! Years ago we spent thousands of GBPs on paid links from newspapers and DMOZ editors to blag our way to the top for the term 'Car Insurance'. We got banned Moneysupermarket.com didn't! There's no justice - but you shouldn't expect any anyway!

Now you've got to be either stupid or suicidal to get yourself banned these days. Yes the big boys 'Buy' paid links by the thousands on a constant and continual basis, but the won't get flagged up amongst the millions of links they've got through other time served methods. They can't 'buy' every searched for kwyword phrase and there are rich pickings for the smaller fish on the feeding grounds where the sharks hang out!

Funnily enough in reality it's the sharks who have the long tails!

So my little newbies, follow the Google webmaster guidelines and your site won't get removed!

The System teaches you to be good on your own site and hang out with the sharks!

If you have had your site removed from Google's Index take a look at this video from The Google Search Quality and SPAM team.



Beat The System

Googles Secret Search-based Keyword Tool

Our friends over at ContentDivas sent us this email this morning reminding us of a much unused secret google keyword spying tool which shows you just how many people are searching for what keywords in your region.

Now we'd usually make you join the system before we give you access to such good Internet Marketing stuff for free, but today we are feeling very generous and just want to show you the sort of stuff you are missing out on by not joining!

Remember if it's not being searched for - it doesn't EXIST!

Here's Shelby

"I just wanted to take a second to point
this long tail keyword suggestion tool from google.

Search-based Keyword Tool

Search-based Keyword Tool

The Search-based Keyword Tool generates
keyword and landing page ideas highly relevant
and specific to your website. In doing so, the
tool helps you identify additional advertising
opportunities that aren't currently being used
in your AdWords and marketing campaigns.

The tool goes one step further by tailoring the
keywords and other data (such as the amount
of competition for the keyword, the suggested
bid, and more) based on your language or country/territory
settings.

Based on your URLs, the Search-based Keyword
Tool displays a list of relevant user queries that
have occurred on Google.com (and on other

Google search properties, such as google.co.uk)
with some frequency over the past year; these
suggestions can be found under the Keywords
tab, in the New keywords related to (site) section.

In the Keywords related to your search section,
you can see a broad list of keyword ideas that are
also relevant, but aren't necessarily based on your site.

The keywords are also organized by category.
Click any category to expand and view its subcategories.
If applicable, you'll also see the keywords organized by
brand names.

I hope you find this useful!!"

Thanks Shelby we certainly found this useful - if you use the export to CSv tool you can create a great excel spreadsheet with every keyword that is searched for!


Beat The System

Is Yahoo Directory Submission worth the Money?

We are often asked, even by experienced pros in the SEO and Internet Marketing industry, whether we think that Yahoo is worth bothering with or more specifically -

"Do you know if there is any benefit to sumbitting websites to yahoo
directory @$299 per year?"

So whats the answer? The bottom line is whether you think that the Yahoo listings are going to return you more value than the GBP200 or $300 that you have to spend initially?

Heres our take:

You will never rank on the first page of Google until you establish authority

The easiest way to achieve this is to obtain links from authority sites.

The Alexa rank for Yahoo (a better rank of authority as it measures usage) is No.2 in the world!

Point proved?

Furthermore about a month before this post was written Google and Yahoo search got into bed with each other again. It's a bit of a soap (geedit?) opera (geddit?)but maybe Yahoo offers google some real latent semantic and/or human editing options!!

The System teaches you to look at the bigger picture!

Beat The System