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Busby SEO Test - Google Top Property In November

Wednesday, December 17th, 2008

Retail sites see big gains

The official start of the holiday shopping season saw Americans flock to online retail sites, boosting several categories, including toys, consumer electronics and department stores, to double-digit traffic gains in November, according to comScore.

“The current economic situation has caused retailers to slash prices and offer highly attractive offers, such as free shipping, to appeal to cost-conscious Americans this holiday season,” commented Jack Flanagan, executive vice president of comScore Media Metrix.

“With budgets a top concern for consumers, the ability to conveniently search the Web to find the best prices has become an increasingly important part of the holiday shopping buying process, for both online and offline purchases.”

Retailing was the top-gaining category for November with retail toys growing 24 percent to 31.3 million visitors during the month, led by Toyrus sites with 15.4 million visitors (up 65%), Barbie with nearly 4 million visitors (up15%), and KB Toys with 2.6 million visitors (up 119%).

Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals drove growth at department stores sites, which jumped 20 percent to 80 million visitors during November. Walmart.com landed the top position in the category with 44 million visitors, an increase of 50 percent from October. Target rose 26 percent to more than 39 million visitors, followed by JCPenny with 18 million visitors (up 39%) and Sears.com with 16 million visitors (up 76%).

With popular electronic items like the Wii, iPods and Garmin GPS on holiday gift lists, consumer electronics category increased 17 percent to 55.8 million visitors. Bestbuy.com led the category with nearly 20 million visitors, a gain of 66 percent from the previous month. Circuit City followed in the second spot with 15.4 million visitors (up 42%), and Wal-Mart electronics grabbed the third spot, more than doubling to 9.5 million visitors.

Google sites continued to be the most visited property in November with 147 million visitors, trailed by Yahoo sites with nearly 144 million visitors and Microsoft sites with 123.5 million visitors.

The holiday shopping season boosted several retailers including, Amazon (up one spot to #8 with 63.5 million visitors), Wal-Mart (up seven spots to #15 with 47.4 million visitors) and Target (up six spots to #18 with more than 39 million visitors). Busby SEO Test

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17.12.2008 Busby, Busby SEO Test News No Comments

Busby SEO Test - The New Language Of Marketing 2.0

Wednesday, December 10th, 2008

Busby SEO Test Tips for using social media

Sandy Carter, author of “The New Language of Marketing 2.0″ talked with WebProNews about the different aspects of using social media in marketing.

Should businesses be more involved in social media or less involved?

Busby SEO Test SC: “In today’s economic climate, I would advise companies to be more involved in social media. The ability to be nimble and move quickly in the market will be THE key element in successful marketing. Marketing organizations need to ensure they are not reactive to change but driving and leading change in a proactive way. Social Media allows your company to be more nimble.”

How?
Busby SEO Test SC: “First, it encourages free-flowing experimentation. You can test an idea online at breakfast and by lunch see the response. You can get fast response and make changes on the fly. It drives changes in how you listen to your customer. Blogs for instance allow you to listen into water cooler discussions you never had access to before. Social Media drives change in how you communicate to the customer as a dialogue versus a broadcast message.”

“And messages meant for one type of audience, are being read by all audiences.
And finally, it cuts down costs. I do not advocate for just using social media techniques however, but rather combining them into your marketing mix allows you to optimize the places where you can maximize their impact.”

What are the best ways for companies to get their messages out using blogs?

Busby SEO Test SC: Determine your goals for blogging. “Is it to solicit input and co-create a new product? For example, IBM’s Project Zero used blogging to get product development direction involving our customers in defining the requirements needed in the marketplace. Make sure you know why you are doing a blog!”

Be personal. “Bloggers share personal tidbits about their lives. Remember that your blog gets you closer to your customer. It strengthens the relationship. Blogs espouse a world view with the voice of the author reflecting his/her ideas (either knowledge or a unique perspective) that may influence perceptions and position those opinions in the marketplace. They foster discussion, debate and even a sense of community. It is most important that you write from the heart.”
What do you see as some of the risks with company blogs?

Busby SEO Test SC: “There are 3 big risks with company blogs.”

“The first is not being honest. Or pretending to be something that you are not.     There have been several examples where companies have paid others to blog for them. Then it is exposed that they were sponsoring the site. Make sure that your blogs reflect the honest facts and truth of your company values.”
“Second is not listening.   I think not listening is worse than not even asking.   I have worked with companies who put feedback tactics in place but then ignored the feedback. Businesses no longer hold absolute sway over the decisions and behavior of consumers.”
“And finally, it is consistency. Developing, planning and maintaining a good blog takes a great deal of time. You must be realistic about the number of posts needed to keep the online relationship with readers alive.   This is a commitment. You need to understand how much time it takes not only to set it up but to keep it current and exciting. You must keep building your readership and online relationships”

. “I spend as much time reading other blogs and finding out what’s going on in the blogosphere as I do writing on my own. To have something to say, you must know what’s being said.”

Top 5 Tips for Facebook for Marketing:

(Sandy has extracted the following tips from Chapter 10 of her new
book.)

Use for Marketing 2.0 Intelligence:Jeremiah Owyang, senior analyst at Forrester Research, says profiles and network information, as well as the public groups, provide a way to seek insight online. Learn about what your customers want!

Busby SEO Test Use for Advertising: There are a variety of ways to leverage the power of this community with banner ads, news feeds, social ads and flyer ads. To reach a new audience: Since neither those under the age of 25 nor those more experienced use email, according to MarketingSherpa Founder Anne Holland, leverage this new social networking tool in place of email. It can extend your reach online where other means can’t!
Experiment with Fan Pages: These fan pages can be used in place of sponsored groups.
Not a stand alone: Integrate your Facebook tactics with your overall strategy. If this is the audience that you need for your product and offerings, leverage as part of the overall go-to market plan.

Do you think social media is here to stay?

Busby SEO Test SC: “Yes, social media is here to stay. For sales it is a new channel, and for marketing it is now part of our marketing mix, forever to stay. Why? Marketing is all about relationships and all relationships have a set of common factors. First, all relationships require listening. Listening has become core to everything. Second, in the best relationships, there is a lot of active communication and dialogue. This dialogue is essential to growth in the relationship. Third, a great relationship is one that is built on honesty.”

“The best way to communicate isn’t about using new media types to be hip and cool; it is about understanding your customers and how you can immerse yourself into their conversation.”

How do you think social media and marketing will evolve? What trends do you see?

Busby SEO Test SC: “As all things change, I know that social media and marketing will evolve. I think that marketers will have to be more business oriented and more technology savvy. They will have to be able to show the value of what they are doing in language that the CEO and the CFO understand. They will also have to be more technical. This does not mean that marketers need to be technologists. But they cannot be afraid of technology. Every marketer needs a set of skills as a user of technology and the new Web 2.0 ways of social networking.”

Anything else you would care to add?

Busby SEO Test SC: “I think social media is very powerful, not because it is cool, fun, and the hot topic right now, but because of the results it can achieve. Marketers, especially in times of recession, get laid off faster than any other type of senior executive because they’re seen as a cost center and not a value center. Marketers need to be able to convince their peers and the management team that marketing is essential, as essential and important and critical as a CFO or a CIO. Understanding the numbers can demonstrate the value.”

10.12.2008 Busby No Comments

Busby SEO Test : How Are People Succeeding on Digg?

Sunday, December 7th, 2008

Busby SEO Test : How Are People Succeeding on Digg? Chris Crum | Staff Writer

Many Elements to the Strategy

Well, some are paying for it directly, but if you don’t want to
do that, you can just develop your reputation and basically make
friends. That is really what it’s all about.

Everyone knows that Digg is a popularity contest. It can still
be a great place to find interesting stories, but it’s not
unbiased. You have to know people (or pay them) to get your
content enough Diggs to really get noticed by the community at
large.

Fortunately for those trying to get a substantial amount of Diggs,
the circle of friends that make up the community isn’t completely
closed. It will however take some effort on your part to earn
their respect and make your way up the ladder of Digg respect.

First of all, Digg’s not supposed to be about marketing, which
is why if you truly want said respect, you need to take the
community seriously, and actually favor them rather than yourself
when submitting articles. You can’t just submit a bunch of your
own content and expect it to go anywhere. You’ve got to submit
appealing content and get your friends to help you digg it.

Earlier this year we covered SearchRank’s five ways to score big
on Digg:

1. Remove Blog Name and/or Sections From Title: all you need is
he title of the post

2. Include Appealing Descriptions (Stay Within Character
Limitations): if you want to practice writing tighter copy, and
you should, sign up for Twitter and practice summarizing your
post in 140 characters, including a link.

3. Submit to the Most Relevant Category (Avoid Multiples if
Allowed): stay on topic; to be specific, stay on one topic.

4. Stay Within The Topic of the Social News Site: SearchRank noted
how sites like Sphinn and Small Business Brief cater to a
dedicated niche. Your submission to these sites should do
likewise. At bigger sites like Digg, keep to the most relevant
category.

5. Will Others Find Your Submission of Interest? Boring only gets
clicked when the facts are truly staggering; think about the
recent revelations about major leaguer Roger Clemens and his
friendship with country singer Mindy McBride.

I would add that stories about Digg are often popular with the
Digg community as well. Probably not a story about succeeding on
Digg, like this one, but ones about things that Digg is doing, why
Digg is great, or what Kevin Rose had for breakfast. Digg users
love Digg, so if you have a lead on something Digg-related and are
the first to submit it, I would say there’s a good chance you’ll
get some play within the community.

07.12.2008 Busby No Comments

Busby SEO Test Basic Google SEO Optimization Tips and Tricks

Tuesday, December 2nd, 2008

Busby SEO Test Basic Google SEO Optimization Tips and Tricks by Alwin Clores

Basic Explaination:

Search Engine Optimization or mostly called SEO is one of the component of Search Engine Marketing, this is the process of Search Engine Ranking to appear in high position when visitors or users conduct a search in specific keywords.

Here are the simple steps to follow:

On-page Optimization

1. Meta tag assigning like meta title, meta description and meta keywords, these are the most important tags that the Search engine reads all the time.

Meta tag Title or Page Title is refer to the Title at the top of your browsers, this can also seen at the search engine results.

Meta tag Description allows you to influence the description of the page(s).

Meta tag Keywords are the list keywords or phrases that you’ve targeted for that specific page.

What Does This Meta Tag Look Like?

The meta tags is placed between the head tag section <head></head>:

<HEAD>
<TITLE>your TITLE KEYWORDS title goes here</TITLE>
<META NAME=”DESCRIPTION” CONTENT=”Your keyword rich marketing sales meta description goes here”>
<META NAME=”KEYWORDS” CONTENT=”your keywords,separated by a comma,but not a space, like, busby seo test”>
</HEAD>

2. The information on a website is its Content, place relevant keywords to your contents. Take note, your keywords to your contents should be appeared because some search engine penalizing your website. Content is the king for your visitors and for search engines as well. I’ll add Busby SEO Test as a keyword.

Internal Links are very important for search engine optimization, always remove your broken links or missing page and make sure search engine bots/spiders can reach all of your pages.

Anchor Text is the text that you see for links on page or offpage, always include your keywords in the anchor text of your internal links, this is very important to inform search engines for your target keywords.

Hidden Text is a text that match your background color ( same color both text and background color in your page) and can’t be seen of your normal visitor, NEVER use any hidden text tricks for your keywords, because search engines will penalize or may even remove your site from their index or search results!

Off-page or Off-site Basic SEO Tips

This is an optimization outside of your page or website, the most powerful way to change your position in Search Engine Result Pages or SERPs.

Components are:

External Links is the most powerful SEO factor; search engines like Google said: If there are many good sites linking to yours then you must have a good content. This is the reason why they will give you a higher rank.

PageRank or Google Page Rank - PR is the quality of the pages that points to your site have more power than quantity. For PageRank checker, you can install to your browser like Firefox or Internet Expolorer at http://toolbar.google.com

Anchor Text of the external links to your pages has the greatest effect for your Search Engine position. If more people are linking to your site using variations of your keywords in the anchor text, this will give you a powerful push for those search terms.

Off-page Content: The content of the pages linking to you is very important for your SEO, the more related content they have to your keywords, the more power those links you can get.

Outbound Links are the links that have a big effect on your site. Always make sure you are linking to good sites or related sites.

Those are not the final words for my Basic SEO Tips but I have tried to post again most important points and most Advance SEO Tips.

About the author:
Alwin Clores is a SEO Consultant / SEO Analyst with far superior SEO knowledge and SEO Experience and owned the Pinoy SEO, a Philippine SEO site. Currently joined the SEO World Cup Busby SEO Test Contest 2008 that goes fastest top 10 ranking for a minimum of 10 days period time.

02.12.2008 Busby, SEO, SEO Basics, SEO Test Tips, SEO Tips No Comments

Busby SEO Test : Google Answers Some Tricky Questions

Monday, December 1st, 2008

Busby SEO Test : Google Answers Some Tricky Questions By Jason Lee Miller

Well, most of them
Recently, during a live chat Q&A, Googlers Matt Cutts and Maile Ohye, among others, faced the burning questions of webmasters around the world. Together, they put to rest some fears and myths, and confirmed some speculations. busby seo test

Below are the meatier results, with the straightest answers given first, followed by responses that were a bit on the ambiguous side, which we took the liberty of translating. Did you know there are about 200 factors that go into determining a site’s ranking in the search results? How about that Google made 450 tweaks to its algorithm last year?

Only one question during that session received conflicting answers from Googlers and wasn’t reconciled: Busby SEO Test : Does the age of a website/domain affect its ranking?

Ohye answered this way: a site’s reputation can be a indicator to search engines, but of course, it’s not everything. Having a site for a long period of time can establish credibility with users, and as a search engine we also want to reflect this type of credibility. Of course, newer domains can also gain users and credibility. It seems like running a good site is a bit like running a reputable business. So yes, if your domain has been credible for years it can help. If you buy an old domain and put all your content on it in hopes of getting instant rankings, that’s not the best idea. busby seo test

But, when the question was rephrased from another webmaster, Cutts answered: In the majority of cases, it actually doesn’t matter–we want to return the best information, not just the oldest information. Especially if you’re a mom/pop site, we try to find ways to rank your site even if your site is newer or doesn’t have many links. I think it is fair for Google to use that as a signal in some circumstances, and I try never to rule a signal out completely, but I wouldn’t obsess about it.

Official translation: Sometimes, when we say it does. busby seo test

busby seo test
GOOGLE STRAIGHT TALK

Busby SEO Test : Do 301 redirects carry over PageRank?

Where appropriate, ranking signals will be transferred across 301 redirects (if the same page has moved from one URL to another). This may take some time, so you should probably leave the redirect in place as long as you have control over the URL.

Busby SEO Test : How many 301 redirects are acceptable?

It’s ok to chain a few together. The HTTP 1.0 standard allows for a maximum of 5 redirects for a URL, so keep it minimal.

Busby SEO Test : Why do pages translated into different languages each have different rankings in their respective engines?

Google looks at content on a URL-by-URL basis, so even if you have translated top content from one language to another, Google might not treat it the same way as they would treat the original content. It’s also possible that the translated content is not as relevant as other original content in that language. Generally speaking, making sure that your content is as unique and compelling as possible for the users in that target market is the best thing to do. busby seo test

Busby SEO Test : Do backlinks from bad sites negatively affect my PageRank?

Those links might be positively affecting your PageRank (PageRank does not go down from “bad” links like those from adult sites). In general, you don’t have to worry about bad links like that which point to your site that aren’t under your control.

How often does your search algorithm change?

We change the algorithms all the time - last year we had over 450 changes. busby seo test

Could sharing an IP address with a bad site get my site penalized?

The situations where it would matter are when the server is overloaded (can’t respond to your visitors) and when it’s incorrectly configured (not returning your site to your visitors). But otherwise that is no longer a concern.

Does Google have a problem with rank-checking software?

Rank-checking software is against Google’s Terms of Service and could result in blocking your IP address, and it doesn’t really help, especially when it comes to personalized or geotargeted results. busby seo test

CIRCUITOUS ROUTES AND TRANSLATIONS
Question: Is there PageRank boost from .edu or .gov links?

Google’s Answer: You don’t get any PageRank boost from having an .edu link or .gov link automatically. If you get an .edu link and no one is linking to that .edu page, you’re not going to get any PageRank at all because that .edu page doesn’t have any PageRank.

Translation: If the .edu or .gov page is linked to, then yes, because that webpage now has some authority, just like with any (non-.gov or .edu) page. busby seo test

Question: Does a page load time play a crucial role in Google Page Ranking? If yes how important is it?

Google’s Answer: I think the more important issue here is user experience. If your site loads fast, your users will be happy; if it loads slow, users will be less happy. Make your users happy, right?

Translation: Yes, and as important as 200 other factors.

Question: Aaron D’Souza of the Search Quality team was reported as stating that publishing the same content on two separate geotargeted paths under your domain will not trigger the dupe content filters. Is this correct?

Google’s Answer: In general, in a case like that, we’d try to pick the best page based on various factors, including geotargeting and language choices. If that page is one which is also available for other geotargeting/language choices, we will generally try to pick the version that our algorithms feel makes the most sense. busby seo test

Translation: Yes, we think.

Question: I have reported sites that clearly have paid links (e.g. the backlink page says “Advertising” above the link), but Google does not seem to take action. Why would that be the case? These are .orgs who are clearly selling their .org juice.

Google’s Answer: While paid links and spam reports are being taken very seriously by Google, the results may not be seen immediately for users or even not at all. This does not mean no action is being taken on the offending sites. Also, the TLD of the sites should not be a factor being taken into account. For this reason reporting both, web spam and PageRank passing link selling makes sense and contributes in an important way to the quality of Google’s index. busby seo test

Translation, partly based on .gov/.edu response: Google treats all top level domains the same, so a .org would have no more juice than a .com or .info. Further, clearly marked paid links (ones on pages labeled “Advertising”) are not necessarily violations of Google’s guidelines. If the links you reported were found to be nofollow links, then no action would be necessary. But keep trying to sabotage the competition. Business is war.

Question: Is it true that the fewer the links FROM your website, the more influence they have on the sites receiving those links?

Google’s Answer: PageRank is split up over the links from a page, but I would recommend not concentrating on this (as you won’t be able to “measure” and act upon it anyway) and instead making your site as usable as possible for your visitors. busby seo test

Translation: Yes, the more you link the more the link juice passed on is diluted, but don’t go trying to figure out the formula in order to game the system. We’ll figure you out. We’re Google.

Question: Does getting a lot of comments in a blog help in being well indexed/ranked by Google?

Google’s answer: Having a lot of enthusiastic users commenting on your posts and doing so generating content on your site, certainly does not harm your rankings Furthermore, a large fan base gives the webmaster a bit of independence from search engine traffic, which is the reason why generating original and compelling content in order to nurture a group of committed users is something I would highly recommend to any blogger

Translation: Yes.

Question: Recently, you removed this suggestion: “Submit your site to relevant directories such as the Open Directory Project and Yahoo!” from your guidelines. Is there any chance that you will be discounting these kinds of links for ranking value in future?

Google’s Answer: There’s always the chance that we’ll discount directory links in the future. What we were seeing was quite a few novice people would see the “directory” recommendation and go out and just try to submit to a ton of directories, even if some of the directories were lower-quality or even fly-by-night directories that weren’t great for users. Right now we haven’t changed how we’re weighting directory links–we’ve only removed the directory suggestion from the webmaster guidelines. busby seo test

Translation: Possibly.

Question: Until recentley (the last six months or so) a high ranking was achievable by submitting articles to article directories (providing they were 40%-60% unique), it no longer seems to be the case. Have links from article sites been de-valued at all?

Google’s Answer: In my experience, not every article directory site is high-quality. Sometimes you see a ton of articles copied all over the place, and it’s hard to even find original content on the site. The user experience for a lot of those article directory sites can be pretty bad too. So you’d see users landing on those sorts of pages have a bad experience. If you’re thinking of boosting your reputation and getting to be well-known, I might not start as the very first thing with an article directory. Sometimes it’s nice to get to be known a little better before jumping in and submitting a ton of articles as the first thing. busby seo test

Translation: Yes. Busby SEO Test

01.12.2008 Busby, Busby SEO Test News, Google News No Comments

Busby SEO Test : What Google’s Matt Cutts Sees In 2009

Sunday, November 30th, 2008

Busby SEO Test : What Google’s Matt Cutts Sees In 2009 By Mike Sachoff

SEO is Changing
WebProNews’ Mike McDonald caught up with Matt Cutts of Google at the Hofbrau Haus in Las Vegas during PubCon to get his views on a number of topics.

Is Ranking Dead?

Cutts said, “I’m not sure I would say ranking is dead but it’s not as important as it used to be. The fact is the smart SEOs are not just necessarily looking at the rankings. They are looking at conversion, they are looking at their server log. It’s great if you’re ranking for a phrase but unless that leads to sales that doesn’t help you very much.”

“The challenge is not to pay so much attention to ranking, pay attention to traffic, pay attention to conversions and keep building good content and don’t worry about ‘can I show people that I rank number one for my trophy phrase.’”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5EP5_idUFKQ[/youtube]

Universal Search In 2009

“Universal is really useful and I think it will continue to expand and what that means in 2009 you can’t just think of yourself as an SEO,” said Cutts.

“SEOs are starting to embrace the fact that they are marketers. It’s a broader spectrum. You have to think about how you build buzz, how do you get loyal customers, how do you optimize your ROI. All those different things and that can include how do I make good videos, do I have a book, things like that.”

Cutts says that people will continue to pay attention to video and images in 2009 but noted a down side. “Of course anywhere there is money there will be spam.” Google has been focusing on its different properties to manage the spam issue.

Busby SEO Test: Metadata

Google has gotten better on Flash and submitting a video to video sitemaps is really helpful in getting onto Google Video Search. “We want to be able to present video from all kinds of places,” said Cutts.

Video File Format

“Whatever file format you want to use is totally fine.”

Busby SEO Test: Mobile

Cutts says that just because search engines are getting better at Flash does not mean mobile is. On mobile devices you can’t just think about search engines. You have to think about the user experience.

Competing with Black Hat SEO

“Black Hat SEO is getting a little more malicious. In a world where Black Hat is moving towards really illegal things as an SEO you have to decide your risk tolerance and do I really want to try to compete with people who are doing illegal stuff or do I want to make a long term site that’s gonna stand the test of time.”

Subdomains

There is no real advantage to using Subdomains. If you have a lot of Subdomains that can be a lot of work. You don’t want to overdo it. Really it’s what ever is easiest for you.

30.11.2008 Busby, Busby SEO Test News No Comments