I recently submitted this blog to Blogcatalog.com and one of the requirements for submission is verifying your blog by providing a link back to Blogcatalog.com. The link I was asked to add to this blog is the following:
http://www.blogcatalog.com/directory/internet/seo
To the reviewer, thanks for stopping by. I am hopeful you will add my blog to the catalog.
Thanks
Chris
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
How to Show up in search engines for multiple country specific results
In my work with international clients, particularly in Europe, I am often asked what is the best strategy to ensure that a client shows up in country specific results in search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN for multiple countries. For example, a client based in Germany with a .de domain may also consider Austria or Switzerland attractive markets, and they may wish to show up in the country specific results under google.de, google.at, and google.ch. Most people would tell you that you have to choose just one. However, there are a number of strategies that one might employ to break into the results for more than one of these.
For those of you that are not familiar with how country specific results work, the general rule is that to show up let's say in Google.de for Germany results only, your site either needs to be physically hosted on a German server or have a .de extension. This only allows for the site to be listed in results for one country however.
One solution to the dilemma above would be to use a country specific domain from one country but host the site on a server physically located in another. In the example above we may choose to use a .de domain while hosting the site physically on a server based in Austria. This would cover two markets, but we would still be without results for Switzerland. To solve this, one solution, although not perfect, would be to set of a sub domain and host the sub domain on a server in Switzerland. This will allow pages of the site to be listed in the country specific results for all three target countries.
You may be dealing with some additional problem here however. First, you are complicating your hosting situation. This is just a matter of management. If set up correctly this can be avoided, but it would take a competent IT team. Another potential issue would be duplicate content. You would want to have unique content at the sub domain as opposed to a duplicate of the main folder. If done correctly, in this instance, you would have all three target countries covered and your business could essentially target all three through country specific searches.
For those of you that are not familiar with how country specific results work, the general rule is that to show up let's say in Google.de for Germany results only, your site either needs to be physically hosted on a German server or have a .de extension. This only allows for the site to be listed in results for one country however.
One solution to the dilemma above would be to use a country specific domain from one country but host the site on a server physically located in another. In the example above we may choose to use a .de domain while hosting the site physically on a server based in Austria. This would cover two markets, but we would still be without results for Switzerland. To solve this, one solution, although not perfect, would be to set of a sub domain and host the sub domain on a server in Switzerland. This will allow pages of the site to be listed in the country specific results for all three target countries.
You may be dealing with some additional problem here however. First, you are complicating your hosting situation. This is just a matter of management. If set up correctly this can be avoided, but it would take a competent IT team. Another potential issue would be duplicate content. You would want to have unique content at the sub domain as opposed to a duplicate of the main folder. If done correctly, in this instance, you would have all three target countries covered and your business could essentially target all three through country specific searches.
Monday, December 3, 2007
Finding a Good SEO Consultant
Finding effective SEO consulting is not an easy task. There are thousands of companies that claim to provide quality SEO services, but most do little more than make some minor on-site changes to your title tags and meta code which ultimately will have little impact on your ranking in a competitive search environment.
When looking for an Internet marketing consultant it is important to research the company that you are going to hire. When hiring an SEO consultant, take the following into consideration:
1. Be sure that your potential SEO consultant is very straight forward about what they are going to do for you, how they are going to do it, and how much it will cost. SEO is not rocket science, and if an SEO company is acting like their strategies are top secret they probably have something to hide.
2. Be sure your potential SEO consultant has a history of success with other projects including their own? If you request such, they should be able to provide you with contacts from other successful projects. If they cannot you are likely wasting your money.
3. It is helpful if your SEO consultant has experience in your industry? This is not essential as SEO is fairly broad across the all industries. However, someone that has had success in a non competitive local market may not find that same success in a competitive general market. You may also find it advantageous in terms of keyword analysis to work with someone that speaks your language in terms of business.
4. Be aware of companies that offer black hat tactics such as IP cloaking, tricky redirects, etc. I have found that most companies that use such tactics have very little idea of what they are doing and are just as likely to get your site banned by search engines as they are to get you to the top.
5. Web designers are not SEO consultants. Many web design companies try to moonlight in SEO. I have found that in almost all cases where I have seen this, they do a very poor job. When it comes to something as important as the ranking of yoru website, stick with a professional.
This post is sponsored by DiscountClick
When looking for an Internet marketing consultant it is important to research the company that you are going to hire. When hiring an SEO consultant, take the following into consideration:
1. Be sure that your potential SEO consultant is very straight forward about what they are going to do for you, how they are going to do it, and how much it will cost. SEO is not rocket science, and if an SEO company is acting like their strategies are top secret they probably have something to hide.
2. Be sure your potential SEO consultant has a history of success with other projects including their own? If you request such, they should be able to provide you with contacts from other successful projects. If they cannot you are likely wasting your money.
3. It is helpful if your SEO consultant has experience in your industry? This is not essential as SEO is fairly broad across the all industries. However, someone that has had success in a non competitive local market may not find that same success in a competitive general market. You may also find it advantageous in terms of keyword analysis to work with someone that speaks your language in terms of business.
4. Be aware of companies that offer black hat tactics such as IP cloaking, tricky redirects, etc. I have found that most companies that use such tactics have very little idea of what they are doing and are just as likely to get your site banned by search engines as they are to get you to the top.
5. Web designers are not SEO consultants. Many web design companies try to moonlight in SEO. I have found that in almost all cases where I have seen this, they do a very poor job. When it comes to something as important as the ranking of yoru website, stick with a professional.
This post is sponsored by DiscountClick
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
