Do Not's In SEO (Search Engine Optimization) for 2011

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Services for Real Estate Pros with Personal SEO - Website SEO and Real Estate Marketing

Do Not's in SEO for 2011 (Search Engine Optimization)seo tactics, seo tips

1. Have ANY text the same color as your background page color. Example: (Example) < you can't see it but it is there. this is dumb, useless and hurts your site from ranking. This is one of the oldest black hat techniques from the 90's, YES I SAID THE 90'S!

2. Keyword Stuff any where! This is mostly found now in titles and in sometimes in content, in alt tags etc.. An Example of this would be: (Service Culture, Bradworthly Service culture expert, Get Service Culture.) I managed to stuff the title with my key phrase 3 times. But this does not help ranking because it does not help the user know what's actually on this page. The page or site will may not rank high because of the keyword stuffing.

3. Use Link Schemes such as reciprocal linking, link farms, link wheels, link exchanges, multiple-way linking, paying for links - JUST SAY NO. While it is fine to exchange links with someone in your same field which does benefit you, it is better to link to a site you want to link to and have the link come up naturally in content.

4. Use Forums and blogs improperly when you are leaving a comment that has your signature on it. Although it's great to leave comments, generate discussions and get your name or profile out there, spamming someone else's blog just for the link is not helpful. Google see's this as spammy and discounts your site and the link. Besides no one likes to read "good post". Add something to the community; this will go a lot farther than your simple comment of "good post". (Even though many comments are "no follow" it's still a great way for visitors to find you and network with you.)

5. Content is NOT KING - QUALITY CONTENT IS KING! Make sure every page on your site is a page that you would want to read and that others would want to read as well. If you don't want to read it then why should you expect others (or Google) to read it? If you have a page similar to all of your competitors have (like in real estate a buyers page) then change yours to make it more compelling and make it a page that a buyer will actually want to read. Give them something to do; a reason to buy from you.

6. Page Rank and Site Rank are dead - or maybe at least on life support. You can not estimate the value that Google places on your site by page rank. I have seen a 0 page rank site rank higher than a site of a 5 page rank for the same keyword. Now on to the hardest item to get your head around. Ranking is dead..... (or is it) For a slower technology adopting industry like real estate ranking is not dead, but for an industry that can adopt to technology faster it may just be on life support. Do you really care where your customer has come from? Do you care if you got them from Google or Facebook? Or are you just happy to have the customer?

It is the focus of business that makes ranking dead not Google. The focus on internet business has been shifted from position to conversion. Who cares if you rank 1st for your major keyword when you're not getting clients off of your site. I tell my customers it is not only my job to increase your site rankings and visibility but it is also my job to increase your conversation rate. You can pay any SEO company to focus on rankings while only a few of them will focus on conversion.

If an SEO company can get you a customer from your website or wherever they market for you and you get paid from that result then you are less likely to ever leave that SEO company. They have provided the best result for SEO; a check in your hand.

Personal SEO provides all types of SEO marketing to real estate clients and others around the country. For excellent tips on real estate in Walla Walla Washington visit LWB Realtors. Our associate in Klickitat county offers homeowners excellent marketing skills when selling property and for expert marketing of ranches in Montana contact Craig del Grande.

 

Posted by

Personal SEO Tim and Tammy Emineth

Personal SEO Facebook Page Personal SEO Instagram Page Tammy Emineth Pinterest Page Personal SEO Linkedin Page Linkedin Page

 

Tim and Tammy Emineth have owned Personal SEO since 2004. We focus on SEO first whether it's blogging, images, website design, IDX solutions and calls to action. We operate with a Storybrand philosophy to encourage more traffic to your site, more eyes on your content and more leads to your business. Call us or email us for a free website audit.

Tim: 425-443-8372  Tammy: 425-344-0677

Comments (65)

Eric Michael
Remerica Integrity, Realtors®, Northville, MI - Livonia, MI
Metro Detroit Real Estate Professional 734.564.1519

Bottom line- just keep writing things you'd like to read about, and you should be fine.

Feb 28, 2011 10:38 AM
Debbie Gartner
The Flooring Girl - White Plains, NY
The Flooring Girl & Blog Stylist -Dynamo Marketers

Tammy - YW.  Interesting comment back to Tim.  Gave me an interesting idea.  Maybe I'll go back to some of my older posts and add a comment (esp on a few that were local & didn't get any comments.)

Feb 28, 2011 11:59 AM
Trang Beuschlein
Homes for Sale in Campbell CA- Broker-BKR Realty - Campbell, CA
Campbell CA Real Estate - Campbell CA Homes for Sa

Hi Tammy, I look forward to your posts now.  They have been an inspiration for me to start blogging.  I actually read all of your old posts related to SEO and blogging and wrote down important take aways so I have all that info in one document to look at when I blog.  Thanks for having such informative posts!

Feb 28, 2011 12:15 PM
Jeff Belonger
Social Media - Infinity Home Mortgage Company, Inc - Cherry Hill, NJ
The FHA Expert - FHA Loans - FHA mortgages - USDA loans - VA Loans

@ Richard... I am not going to respond entirely to what you said.. I am waiting for Tammy to respond. But from what I know, i think you might be mis-interpretating some of the words and or meanings. The end result is that I get e-mails and phone calls from people that find me in unique ways, searches, and not by what you or I might think would be searched more... odd searches. But back to page rank. .. even if one has a zero page rank and people are still finding me.. this is what Tammy mentioned and I believe in this because it actually happens to me.  I guess it comes down to how one skins a cat. I guess what I most disagree about is this statement of yours... "I maintain that if all Rainers would include a linkback to their own website in their comments, they would elevate the entire AR community by creating such a hub of activitiy that SEs would see AR as the clear leader in real estate communication."

Again, I am not an expert, but many comments are 'no follow' comments. There is inofrmation that suggests that google does not follow links in comments.. some have suggested otherwise. But from what I know, google won't index such types of comments with links. SO if most of this is ture, what you are suggesting wouldn't work anyhow.. and what any of this did, when people tried working around 'no follow', designing other ways to control the flow of page rank, if I am correct in saying, this was called page rank sculpting. I know at times on my outside site, The FHA Expert, I get quick comments that have links to their sites. This is actually spamming in my mind and I can see why Tammy even brought this up and thinks it's a bad type of comment. but again, I am very interested in what Tammy might have to say. I am not an expert in this part.. and I want to learn. If I have a weak link.. ha ha.. it would be about 'no follow' tags. thanks

jeff belonger

Feb 28, 2011 12:21 PM
Jeff Belonger
Social Media - Infinity Home Mortgage Company, Inc - Cherry Hill, NJ
The FHA Expert - FHA Loans - FHA mortgages - USDA loans - VA Loans

white hat seo

Tammy... I just came across this ad... pretty funny come to think of it.. we know Black hat SEO is not good, especially if caught. One might presume white hat is good, but more than good, that maybe that person has a good way for SEO that others don't know about. The end result in my opinion is that white hat is merely just being ethical when applying all SEO rules. Maybe one can say creative marketing?

 

 

jeff belonger

Feb 28, 2011 01:07 PM
Wayne B. Pruner
Oregon First - Tigard, OR
Tigard Oregon Homes for Sale, Realtor, GRI

Hi Tammy, Thanks for the useful information. As always, you have good stuff.

Feb 28, 2011 03:11 PM
Sharon Alters
Coldwell Banker Vanguard Realty - 904-673-2308 - Fleming Island, FL
Realtor - Homes for Sale Fleming Island FL

Tammy, even when the comments are no follow, such as here, when they go to outside blogs, they are followed. I have picked up my comments made here that went to outside blogs on my StepRep notifications.This is a very helpful post. Thanks.

Sharon

Feb 28, 2011 03:52 PM
Anonymous
Flexsin Seo Marketing

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Feb 28, 2011 06:23 PM
#53
Tammy Emineth
Personal SEO - Website SEO and Real Estate Marketing - Frenchtown, MT
Content Marketer, SEO Teacher, Website Fixer

Lydia, Andrew, kerissa, Tommy, EMily, Bill, Gay, Bill G, Trang, Wayne,     Thank you I apologize for not responding individually as this blog got away from me. HA.  I appreciate your feedback and comments! :)

~T

 

Mar 01, 2011 01:08 AM
Tammy Emineth
Personal SEO - Website SEO and Real Estate Marketing - Frenchtown, MT
Content Marketer, SEO Teacher, Website Fixer

Jeff -Thanks for picking up from Richard also, this blog got away from me and I apologize, But you're right on the PR info. I wrote to Richard below.. also about the no follow I wrote this article about the no follow tag a couple weeks ago.  You're right, search engines know the link is there but don't follow it and it doesn't count as a back link in most cases. Some blogs may be different, AR is this way.

Also, you got the idea of what I was saying, that it doesn't matter where your clients are coming from and one shouldn't put all your SEO eggs into the search engine basket. Use back links, blogs, articles, great content and all the other techniques working together to create a solid site that is not only found on the search engines but everywhere else too. Site ranking is just not as valuable as it once was. PEople are getting smarter and finding referrals and agents through a variety of other facets. These are what we need to capitalize on.

Interesting site you found there.. most don't even know what white/black hat means. But keeping it all above board and doing it the organic, old fashioned way will take longer, but be a more solid site.

Richard - PR ( Page ranking ) is the number Google assigns the site. Of course a site like Google would have 10. MSN 9 and so one. It really doesn't mean a whole lot because as I said, I have seen a PR 0 site get higher attention than a PR3 site. SITE RANKING would be where the site sites on the search engine list when searched for.  Yes, Site ranking does still matter but not nearly as much as it used to. Even just over the last couple months I have seen more solid leads come from sites that have most of their percentage of visitors from referring sites and not search engines. That tells you something.

backlinks are also a vital part of the puzzle, yes you have to have good back links. Having a combination of different types of inbound links, out bound links and keyword anchored links spread all over certainly makes for good SEO. BUT I will let you know that Active Rain has a policy about placing a link to yourself on other people's comments. I don't mind it really at all, but they have that as a rule so you might be careful. Also, comment links are no follow, which only really stops the search engines, they still know the link is there but won't follow it, People, on the other hand, will. :)

I hope I have answered all your questions. Thanks for the discussion!! I value it. :)

~T

 

Mar 01, 2011 01:31 AM
Erika Rogers
Red Rock Real Estate ~ Southern Utah's Largest Independent Brokerage - Saint George, UT
St George Utah Real Estate & Relocation Specialist

Thanks for the great pointers, I can always count on you for important tips!

Mar 01, 2011 05:29 AM
Brad Hornshaw
Brad Hornshaw Realtor Lynnwood, Bothell, Everett - Lynnwood, WA
Realtor, Listing Agent, Buyers Agent, Investments
Hi Tammy Thanks for your clarification I think I am starting to get a handle on what your saying. I am a new SEO student still so a bit slow, but your posts are a big help to me. Thanks again .........Brad
Mar 01, 2011 09:06 AM
John Novak
Keller Williams Realty The Marketplace - Las Vegas, NV
Henderson, Las Vegas and Summerlin Real Estate

Good points on keywords and quality content. Some real estate sites seem to post with way too much emphasis on SEO rather than human readers. Sure, the site may rank well and get traffic from Google, but does that convert to business?

Mar 01, 2011 09:17 AM
Steve Smither
Cardinal Financial Company - Inverness, IL

Great points Tammy. I am just starting my web site and blog posts. This was very helpful information.

Continued success...

Mar 01, 2011 02:44 PM
Diane Plant
Forest Hill Real Estate Inc, Brokerage - Toronto, ON
Broker, TorontoHomeSearch: Forest Hill Real Estate

Lead conversion-that's what I really need to get going-not about the ranking

I would like to know what websites you have run across that you think are really fabulous and do the things that get the attention from the buying public.

Mar 03, 2011 02:19 PM
Victoria Stankard
Get Found Now - Tampa Palms, FL

"5. Content is NOT KING - QUALITY CONTENT IS KING! Make sure every page on your site is a page that you would want to read and that others would want to read as well. If you don't want to read it then why should you expect others (or Google) to read it? If you have a page similar to all of your competitors have (like in real estate a buyers page) then change yours to make it more compelling and make it a page that a buyer will actually want to read. Give them something to do; a reason to buy from you."

You are so right on! Love your post :-) Victoria

Mar 04, 2011 10:39 AM
Robert Vegas Bob Swetz
Las Vegas, NV

Hello Tammy and VB missed this post, another feature ... you are becoming the "Feature Queen" around Activerain!

Vegas Bob ;o)

PS - Keep up the great work!

Mar 06, 2011 05:19 PM
Rich Cederberg
eXp Realty - Albuquerque, NM
eXp Realty Agent Albuquerque

Page rank and site rank are dead. I've seen just what you're talking about, however, are backlinks that come from higher ranked sites are still better than links that come from unknown sites/pages?

What do you think about the role of social media for SEO in 2011? Love to hear your thoughts on that topic.

Mar 12, 2011 05:17 AM
Tammy Emineth
Personal SEO - Website SEO and Real Estate Marketing - Frenchtown, MT
Content Marketer, SEO Teacher, Website Fixer

Thanks all for your comments!! I really value them!

Rich,  Backlinks from heavier sites DO matter but not necessarily the PR status. .gov .edu sites are the best to get a back link from but are really hard to do so. A typically well optimized site will give you a great back link, whatever it may be.

~T

Mar 12, 2011 08:07 AM
Jordon W.Y. Wong, Jr.
Marcus & Associates, Inc. - Kailua, HI

Thanks for the useful information.  Can't wait to learn more!

Apr 14, 2011 03:28 PM