Net66 SEO: Mixed Messages From Google Webmaster?

A post I read recently discussed what you need to evaluate when you get a manual penalty from Google. Some people generally get as many link reports that they can and then scythe through them hoping to cull anything that looks a bit out of the ordinary.

But the post I read was talking about just analysing the links from within Webmaster tools itself. However there are other examples which have shown that just analysing the links in Webmaster tools isn’t enough. Matt Cutts, head of the webspam team at Google, has addressed and recognised this by releasing a statement as follows:

It’s certainly the case that we endeavor to show examples from the set of links returned by Webmaster Tools, and likewise we prefer to assess reconsideration requests on that basis of those links. However, if there’s a really good example link that illustrates a problem, we do leave enough room to share that link, especially because it can help point the webmaster in a better direction to diagnose and fix issues.

So it shows that although Google do try, that is all they can do. Try. So if you’re ever on the receiving end of a manual penalty, then don’t rely solely on Webmaster tools to recuperate. Use other link analysis software and make sure to examine as many links as possible to try and find what is hurting your site.

Net66 SEO: Content Marketing Myths

There has been such a bit buzz around content marketing since it first emerged as a “thing” almost a year ago. As with all things SEO, it has been taken to excess with a lot of people getting it wrong through a combination of over-enthusiasm and impatience. Here are some of the biggest myths concerning Content Marketing:

Shorter Blogs are Better

It makes sense to a degree. Everyone is so pressed for time these days that small, condensed blogs are the right choice as people can read them on the go and want the information there and then. But is that right? A lot of people are saying no and there are a few posts I’ve read that have proved that their sites longer posts have benefitted from more exposure.

On average posts between 1,100 and 1,400 words long performed better in popularity than other posts between 300 and 800 words long. I’ve found personally as well, some of the more popular Net66 blogs have more content on there than other short blogs. I’ve verified this through our Google Analytics and can say that it works.

More Frequent Content = Better Content Marketing

If you read the first point about longer blogs performing better, then you can understand already why more frequent content isn’t always the best. To create a blog post in excess of 1,100 words every day is no easy feat. Unless you employ a solitary writer to spend a full day on a blog post each day of course, which of course isn’t really viable.

So what should you do? The answer is simple, take your time. Quality beats quantity every time, so here’s some tips on writing a more quality blog post:

> Find a subject worth pursuing
> Gather the correct stats
> Source some brilliant images
> Allow yourself the time to do it properly

After you’ve done all that you should feel suitably tired and mildly as if you’ve wasted time that could have been spent doing something else. Well you’re wrong! What you’ve done is draw up some quality content, backed it with stats and presented it beautifully. Much better than rushing out 200 words on something vaguely related to your subject.

If you follow the above two tips then you’ll soon find yourself with a lot more time to spend researching your blog posts and allowing yourself time to create them.

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66 SEO: Should you Nofollow Links on an Embeddable Widget?

The short answer is yes. As Matt Cutts goes on to explain below:

Net66 SEO: How to Apply Schrödinger to SEO

Today Google pays homage to Erwin Schrödinger on his 125th birthday. See the Doodle below:

The principle itself is quite complicated to understand but I’ll do my best to explain it. You start off with three items; a cat, a glass phial containing a lethal poison and small piece of radioactive material. These three items are put into a box with the glass phial set to detect radioactivity, and If the phial does detect radioactivity (which it surely will) then the glass will shatter, releasing the poison and killing the cat.

At this moment I’d like to explain that this is a thought experiment. No cats were harmed in the construction of this blog post.

As there is an air of inevitability about the poor cats demise you can then apply the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics (you’ll have to take me at my word for that) to state that the cat is both alive and dead at the same time. Alive because not enough time has passed for the phial to smash, and dead because the cat is inevitably doomed.

It’s meant to pose the question of when does quantum superposition (cat both alive and dead) end and when does reality kick in to determine the outcome of the cat’s fate i.e. peering into the box.

Interesting no doubt but how does this apply to SEO? Sit tight and I’ll tell you, we’ll just be making a few simple swaps.

Instead of a cat you have blog post you’ve written. Instead of a box you have someone else’s blog/email address. The radioactive material is instead you requesting to publish a blog, and the glass phial is the blog owner who will smash/publish a post when it detects a request and a blog post.

So, you find the blog you wish to publish on (the box) and put in your blog post (the cat), the author (the glass phial) and your request for the author to publish it (radioactive material).

So as it stands it is inevitable that your blog post will get published on the authors blog. But when you put them in the box together the author still needs to detect the request which will then trigger him to publish your article. So at the same time, again applying the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, your blog post is simultaneously published and unpublished. The same as the cat being alive and dead.

The only way to then stop the quantum superposition of this is to then “peer in the box” by checking the blog.

Simple really. I think?

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Net66 SEO: View manual actions in Webmaster Tools

For a long time now there have been many issues with people believing that they have been penalised by Google and have received a Manual Action Penalty. This is when some one at Google takes the time to evaluate your site and then applies a penalty to the site manually.

In days gone by you were never officially alerted to this fact and were left wondering whether the site was down to algorithmic changes or Manual actions. But now Google, who have in the past promised to streamline and clarify their webspam actions, have added a feature in Webmaster Tools where you can see if your website has been the victim of a Manual Action penalty.

If you log in to your Webmaster account and navigate to where it says “Search Traffic” then you can see under that list is the option entitled “Manual Actions”. This is what you’d click to see if you have a penalty against you, most of the time though you’ll see “No manual webspam actions found” which is mainly due to the fact that only 2% of websites on the internet have been affected.

If you do find that you have a manual action against you, the new reporting tool gives you more of an inclination as to what the penalty is for and in some cases will give an example. In Matt Cutts Blog Post for the official Google Webmaster Blog he uses his own website as an example of the tools reporting prowess, you can see the screenshot below:

Once you’ve then dealt with whatever was causing the Manual Action Penalty then you can submit a reconsideration request from the same place. In doing this the whole process is streamlined and will lead to much better results in the search engine listings.

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

Google’s Link Scheme Guidelines: Press Releases should use nofollow links just like adverts

It was recently confirmed that Google have changed the webmaster guidelines when it comes to link schemes. The main rule they have concentrated on is the keyword rich anchor text within press releases and the links should include the nofollow attribute. Similar to that of paid advertisements, this ensures that paid links do not pass on any value to search engines.

The precise line in the updated link schemes guidelines is:

“Links with optimized anchor text in articles or press releases distributed on other sites.”

I researched more about this and have found a Google Hangout video by John Mueller who is the head webmaster trends analyst, it is clear that Google are turning to press releases as advertisements hence the change in link scheme. Press releases will still drive a lot of traffic to your website but take note of these new guidelines and instead of linking with your keyword use brand name, url or generic anchor text as these will still carry the follow attribute, therefore passing on PageRank.

Another interesting point is that in the past Matt Cutts has publicly came out and said that links within articles and press releases do not pass link juice, when many people who work in the SEO world know that it is not true in the slightest!

It seems to me that Google are taking a more direct approach about paid advertising and link schemes but also to the overuse of paid links within articles. Take a look at the Google Hangout video with John Mueller and let us know what you think.

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Blog Post by Jordan Whitehead

What can I do to help my SEO company get great results

A question often asked by website owners who employ the services of an SEO practitioner, and a it is a great question.

Before I answer this, let us consider what Google is looking for when it indexes a site.

In a very general way, it is looking for sites that have good traffic levels, low bounce rates , has good links from well ranked sites and plenty of good relevant text.

A lot of the work that needs doing to get a website ranked is technical and statistical and needs to be coordinated, so if you employ an SEO practitioner, let them do all that, that is what you are paying for.

Search Engines like to see relevant links to your site. So if you are a business talk to you suppliers and get them to put a link on their website linking to your website, if there is a trade association do the same. Often times you know and talk to other companies in the same field, get a link from them.
What you must not do, is go crazy about links, getting a link to your site from a Far Eastern gambling site is more likely to do you more harm then good, Unless you are a gambling website, and then it is counted as a relevant link and will be positive.

Use Social Media. There are a lot of businesses who cannot see the benefit, do not forget the old addage “There is no such thing as bad publicity” This is as true to day as ever.
Go on to Facebook, Google+, Twitter and as many of the social media sites you can find, and start pages for your company.
If you are a builder, put up images buildings you have built, before and after pictures, if you sell industrial widgets, tell the world just what these widgets do and what value they are, and include links back to your home site
This will show search engines that how far and wide your reputatation has spread, and give SEO points for it.
A note of caution. Google is not daft, far from it, so if overnight you create many many Social media , and many many blog posts, you will be rumbled and penalised
Neil McVey

Is Web design a factor in SEO

Like every other question that there is about SEO, it could be answered with the phrase “Well, yes and no.” Continue reading “Is Web design a factor in SEO”

Net66 News: What Wonderful Clients we Have.

It’s Friday, the sun is shining, people are happy and our clients love us. Especially two of them.

Pathways Training and Brite White Teeth have both seen fit to send recommendations our way today who both, on the strong recommendations of their friends have signed up.

So at Net66 we want to say a massive thank you to our clients, and that

we love you too!

Thank You

Net66 SEO: Matt Cutts on Linking 20 Sites Together

First of all, 20 domains different sites on 20 different domains is quite a lot. Like, really a lot. So why would you want to link them all together? See Matt Cutts’ video response here:

The Practice of Choice

SEO Choices

Oh Dear Oh Dear I cannot make up my mind !
How many times do we all here that,and how many times do we all say that, and think that

Surely this conundrum has been around forever, and in this modern world we live in there is more and more choice about more and more things.

Linux vs Windows, Google vs Bing(no competition) , Libre Office(Open Office) vs MSWord, Apple vs PC, Organic SEO vs Pay per Click (PPC)

Was there ever a time when life was less complicated and we go about our business without a care, probably not.

For small businesses some of these choices are vital.
There is a compelling case for small businesses to use Linux, so as to save a small fortune sending license fees to Microsoft. Then again, unless you are a Linux fan, and have a tame Linux boffin you may be best sticking with Windows, as the world is full of Windows “experts”
The international space station now uses Linux and has moved away from Windows, so if it is good enough for them, it is more than good enough for the office

Libre Office , in my opinion is a good choice, I have used it for years and it has been a stalwart. And to back me up no less than the Australian Government has now standardised on the open source formats that Libre Office use

Now I need to declare an interest before I go on, as I am about to favour Organic whitehat SEO over PPC.

But now we are back to choice, it is more than possible to obtain best value long term results from organic SEO
But to do this you need to choose an SEO practitioner with care.
There are many to choose from, some good, some bad and some brilliant.

My advice is to talk to your SEO regular, and ask their advice. If you get the same old lines of sales talk, think again.

The practice of SEO is wide and varied, and there are no quick fixes, so if your SEO professional suggests new and varied strategies, this is because they are keeping up with the ever vigilant and innovative technicians at Google HQ

The relationship between an SEO company and the Webmaster should be a collaborative partnership, so to coin an old phrase “It is good to talk”

Neil McVey

Net66 SEO: Black Hat SEO Rookie Mistakes

We focus a lot on White Hat SEO here at Net66, but as with all things understanding what goes through the anti-Net66 helps. So we keep up to date with the latest black hat techniques. Not that we would ever use them, we do this just so that we can see what Google will be penalising in the future.

Because with Google, the house always wins. You might have a good one, a great one in fact, but Google will find your black hat and will slam your website into the ground nose first.

I’m bringing this up because as an SEO I like to think I have a grasp of what’s good and what’s bad. But on a recent expedition into the other side, I discovered that just like White Hat SEO, Black hat SEO has it’s noobs (newbies – newcomers) as well. A realisation I was surprised at as I’d assumed all black hats had a handle on things.

But the question was this:

“If I put black text links on a black background, will Google find them?”

Any SEO worth their salt would tell them this is a bad idea and that’s exactly what happened (bar the trolls who told them it was a great idea). But there are rookies now in all aspects of SEO and it reminded me of me when I was just started out and asked perceived daft questions, often receiving daft answers.

So don’t be afraid to ask any questions as you can only learn from the answers you get.

Blog Post by: Greg McVey

SEO – makes the World a Safer Place

After the fury that Edward Snowden caused by telling us all something that we probably already suspected that, our Governments are looking after us and are actively looking for the bad guys out there who want to do us harm, how does SEO fit into all of this ?

Google, and other search engines, have amassed a huge amount of technology in automatically reading absolutely huge amounts of text, and then somehow making sense of it.

Your average search engine can crawl through millions of webpages, index them and selectively serve them back up to us as and when we enter a search query, all within time scale of “two shakes of a lambs tail”

I do not know what goes on at Spy Central, but I guess a liberal use of the software and technology that search engines use is borrowed and adapted to find recurring key words and phrases in communications that fly around the world.

How much of the research and development and blue sky thinking that are put into making our search life easier is diverted to make our real lives safer, is anybodies guess

This is not the place to be political, there are many other other blogs that can discuss those matters so much better than I.

So next time I am toiling away in my office Manchester trying to SEO a phrase to death, and nothing bad has happened, and the lights are on as they should be, and the world carrying on as it should, I will spare a thought for all of the technicians and machines all over the world that are working to keep us all safe.

I think it would be milking it a bit to claim that all SEOs are heros, but all of us who practice the noble art of SEO have made a contribution, however small

Ps If you are a machine in Spy Central and you are reading this “Good day to you”

Neil McVey

Manchester – The Home of Innovation

Manchester – Home of Digital Enterprise

Call me biased, and you would be right, I am Manchester born and bred, and proud of it.
Ok, I have spent my life wondering when it going to stop raining, and recently cannot understand why the Manchester scallies always talk through their nasal passage( yes I said nasal , although I have heard some talk other ways)

But what a City, what a history of inventions and innovation!

The device you are reading this is on a distant offspring of the first computer to store its own programme which was built and developed at Manchester University by Alan Turing. Henry Royce made his first car luxury here, Coronation Street is made here, the Trades Union Congress was formed here mainly because Manchester was at the heart of the Industrial Revolution.
We also have some top drawer footie teams in Manchester City and United.

And now we have the BBC.
OK, most of those media types had have a general anaesthetic before they came “Up North” but some of them have woken up and realised that there is something going on up here.

Now we have a vibrant and lively digital community, springing out from the Manchester Technology Park.
Graphics, Design, Development and SEO, are all being being pushed to the limits by a whole community of boffins.

SEO in Manchester is being developed and adapted in the way that Mancunians have always done, pushing the boundaries of Search Engine Optimisation in inventive ways

There is a healthy competition between all of the SEO technicians in Manchester and that can only be a good thing as we all compete to get the best search results for our clients

Yes I am biased and I love Manchester, and yes I am biased and love my company Net66, so if you do need any SEO I wholeheartedly and unashamedly recommend you come to us in the Northern Quarter of this fair city

In the interest of fairness → Other Cities and other SEO companies are available

Neil McVey

How Much Blether does Google want to read ?

Before I go any further, I want to say what a great job Google Search Engine is doing in difficult circumstances

Judging by the amount of emails I get from our SEO colleagues in the far east, and thinking about the UK SEO community, worldwide there must be hundreds of thousands of SEO’ers spending millions of hours trying to promote various websites for various phrases.

Has Google crumbled, not a bit of it. But what they have done is fall into a trap of unintended consequences ( in my humble opinion)

Quite rightly, the boffins at Google HQ are always trying to be one or two steps ahead of us SEO workers, and that is how it should be, but I think the last Penguin update wilhave a curious effect.

I can imagine the guys at Google HQ having brilliant idea.
“Lets favour those sites that generate a bit of interest, those sites that start of slowly, and because real people like them, they get visitors and comments and blog posts and links from multiple social media accounts”
What could possibly go wrong?

On the face of it, it is probably what we all would have done

SEO practitioners worldwide, out number Google by at least 1 million to one, (maybe more) and nearly all of those have now created at least one blog, 3 social media accounts and submitted paragraphs of text to another 5 directory s for each of their many clients, and are now adding keyword rich relevant content to all of those accounts on a regular basis.

Multiply that by the number of clients we all have, and the numbers of erroneous and completely made up articles that are being published every week and the amount of words to be read by the ever vigilant googlebot can only be measured in light year numbers

It is a common “well known fact” that there is now more data being stored right now, than the whole of the human race has amassed in in our entire chequered history.
Most of this data is probably backups of backups, multiple photos of drunk friends on Social Media sites and stored emails that were never read in the first place.

Now this data mountain will added to by millions and millions of articles. Written daily by SEO bods around the world, all trying to emulate the gradual organic growth of genuinely interesting sites on websites about “left handed widgets” and the like
There is a need for “left handed widgets” and there is a need, as and when we need them, for all of us to be able to find them. I think that task will now become harder and harder for search engines as the “needle in a haystack” effect gets more intense

Google has now got to read all of these and try and make sense of them all, so good luck to them, and although it will not happen anytime soon, they are going to have to find an easier way of doing things.

Being an old codger myself, I think we should go back to the simple times when “meta tags” were king

Neil McVey

How to choose an SEO reliable and cost effective practitioner

SEO is one of those things that all websites need, and that a lot of website owners do not fully understand the complexities of, and where there are an awful lot of company who are selling “SEO” and providing a poor and sometimes non existent service.

There are a many many companies doing an absolutely great service and are being tarnished by the bad practice ehics from the Black Hat SEO companies.

So if I run a website, and I am not an SEO Technician, how can tell the good stuff from the bad stuff ?

First of all remember that old phrase that all consumer programs and magazines keep repeating, “If it seems to good to be true, it is to good to be true”

A reputable SEO company will be honest and up front that it cannot guarantee that it can make Google do anything.
Google is a massive and hugely clever organisation, so no matter how insistent anyone may be, they cannot make a call to Google HQ and say “Put this website on page 1 for this phrase”

Good companies will ask more questions than give you the hard sell.
What is it you want to achieve, what are your products, what is your market, what is your budget, what is your area for expansion.
Unless an SEO company can get a handle on your business and ambitions for your website, it cannot tailor the service to the best results

Talk to your chosen company, you will get an idea of are they just trying to “Close an order” or are they genuinely trying to help you

Call me biased and prejudiced, but I would recommend Net66, we are an SEO company based in Manchester City Centre, and I here you thinking “He would say that wouldn’t he”

We want to understand how your business and your website work together
How your customers come to your website
What they are looking for and why they should buy your product or service rather than your competitors

then we can give you the Biggest Bang for your Buck
Ring us on 0161 820 5471

Neil McVey

Net66 SEO: The Best Web Design Tips for SEO

Website Navigation

Navigation is one of the most important factors that needs to be considered when building a new website. Your menu bar opens the whole of your website up to your visitors so needs to be as clear, concise and easy to use as it can be. When Designing your menu bar you need to make sure that it is both search-engine and user friendly. This way the structure of your menu will help boost your rankings, and when visitors arrive on your website, your menu can make your user’s visit a pleasant experience. The user will be richer for the experience and be more likely to visit you again to purchase an item or service.

URLs

Your root domain and all subsequent pages are highly important to your website’s performance in the Search Engines as well as User experience. For example, which URL would you be more likely to click on:

https://netsixtysix.co.uk/internet-marketing/ or https://netsixtysix.co.uk/?pageid=188 ??

You’d click on the link you understand, of course you would. Page Id 188 holds no meaning for you so you may not wish to click it as it could be misleading.

Images

Images do matter in SEO and humans need to be swayed by good looking images. Here are the main points in optimising images:

Alt Tag everything. Traditional spiders have eight eyes, Google’s spider has none. So you need to describe your images to Google otherwise it wont know what it’s looking at or even if it’s relevant to your site or keywords.
Optimise for speed. Everyone do loves quality these days but having a 300 dpi images thousands of pixels wide on your site is going to take a long time to load. Users get bored easily these days so a quicker load time = more engagement. Google know’s this and is likely to give you a boost if you have a quicker site.

Follow these tips and you should have a great website to work with from the off of your SEO Campaign.

Greg McVey

Hats off to Google

Firstly , lets say “Hats off to Google “ They have to be one of the cleverest companies in the world. Look at what they have achieved,

Google the Search Engine is a huge , no huge does not even come close, humongeous is nearer the mark, achievement.
The statistics are astounding, billions of web pages read, inspected, indexed and sorted every month

Google Earth
They have a picture of my house, my street, my neibourhood and I can “virtually” drve up and down my street and go around town. I can visit Buckinham Palace, The Sidney Opera House, The Whitehouse, and more amazeingly if I were to put and address of almost anywhere in the world I could visit there. Millions if not billions of images all linked seamlessly together

Google Books
They are in the process of copying and putting online all the books in the world, yes ALL the books in the world. From Ancient manuscripts that may have been written when at the time the Pyramids were built, to todays bestsellers and all of the books that have ever been published

You Tube, Google Maps, Gmail, Calendar, Drive, and there achievments go on and on.

So if you have got a website, and want to try and hoodwink Google into listing it above where it merits, you will have to , as my Grannie used to say, ‘Have to get up very early in the morning’

So if you have a website, and want potential customers to find your website and become real life customers, give us a call at www.net66.co.uk

Blog Post by Neil McVey