You are all awesome! I took your ideas, suggestions, and ran with them. Okay, I crawled, then got up, stumbled, and I am starting to walk now - but I`m now moving!

My SEO got he SOS I needed thanks to you! I am slowly getting closer to the top of the list and in some cases (mostly MSN and Yahoo search) I am on the first page and even #1 on some keywords.

I just started a blog, www.SpiderMilk.com per FreshYield`s and Coach Deb`s suggestions - thank you and thank you Chuck and all you SUNsational people!

Anyone want to optimize their website? Just read and follow the suggestions above.

 

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Have a Creepy Crawly Day!

Seth, Bugmaster
www.CoolBugStuff.com

That`s outstanding Seth, I`m really happy to hear that.  Keep plugging away at it, there`s always more things to improve, and keep us informed on your progress!

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chuck fuller

I just now got into SEO writing, and it`s fascinating! I`ve been a writer for quite awhile, and I learned to always, always make it interesting, and don`t be redundant! If you have the same word in the same sentence, don`t do it! (Sort of an Anti-Nike kinda person!).

All that set aside, SEO writing is like anti-writing! It`s like creating a crossword puzzle---not doing one, creating one. Nobody knows the algorithms the SEs (search engines) use, and they change. Nobody knows the rules, but some are visible in the results. It`s like playing chess with a machine that`s controlled by a human, who changes the rules whenever they feel like it, and you have to figure them out by guesswork.

But it all comes down to knowing first what type of thing people will search for that could remotely connect with your site. So you`ve got a site about bugs. Then, right on the main page you have your "About Me" stuff. Not good. Nobody`s gonna search for Seth, (unless it`s the Seth Material by Jane Roberts).

Everything`s in one paragraph, so it`s hard to see, but there`s at least two mentions of "creepy crawly." Would your next-door neighbor sit back, pop a beer, open Google and type in "creepy crawly" for some reason? Probably not.

What you want is to "pre-think" the kinds of things people you want on your site will likely search for. So, you can look for entomologists, entomology, and zoology. You can include biology, insects, and so forth. But that`s the scientists.

Then you`ll want kid names, so you`ll have spiders, snakes, ants, flies, bugs, mosquitoes, mosquitos, mosqitos, muskitos, masketoes, and every other kind of misspelling on the hard ones, JUST so the search engines can see it. Every picture should use alternate text with the name of the bug both science-like and kid-like.

Alternate text for a spider image: Spider, arachnid, 8-legged bug, daddy longlegs.

You don`t HAVE to have this SEO text right at the top, in your face. It can be low on the page, almost to where someone gets tired of scrolling and blows it off. It can be in any size font, like a disclaimer. But you can`t just list word after word after word, or the SE will see it as Spam.

How do you say it all in a paragraph? Redudancy!! But it should be clever redudancy--clever repetition. (Remember word stemming, where spider, spiders, spidered, and spider-like, all count as "spider.")

Here`s what you have as your Welcome statement:
Welcome To The Site That Promotes Education and Exploration With Nature’s Most Abundant And Fascinating Creatures…BUGS!

"to" "the" "that" "and" "with" "most" "and" are all articles, all of which immediately get dropped from any query in Google. "Welcome" and "Site" are pointless, as every single site has those words. So they`re effectively dropped.

What`s left, and how does it relate to insects? "Promote" and "Education" will rank you with anyone who wants to know how to get promoted to the next level of their career, through furthering education.

Nature and nature`s are the same, and will put you into a gazillion results about nature, natural, and bad-natured. "Fascinating" is mostly an adjective, so it ends up in dictionary results or the other bazillion sites where everyone who`s a literary critic uses the word to describe their next book.

What`s left? Creatures and Bugs. 2 words, both generic, neither of which particularly are relevant to YOUR site in terms of "the count." How many times does the word "creature" show up in a site: That`s what Google is examining when someone puts in "all God`s beautifule creatures." On your site.....once.

Bugs is also too generic. So...ya got nuthin! LOL!! :-D Hey....I`m ONLY trying to show you how SEO works...for your edification.

I`d put "Welcome to Cool Bug Stuff" in a JPG or GIF, so the engine won`t even see it, but human beans will. Then use your "slogan" or mission statement more effectively to be found by kids searching for stuff about bugs.

"Catch fireflies, trap spiders, watch dragonflies, play with frogs, and learn about bugs, insects, snakes, creepy-crawlie things, and toads all at once."

Okay, so you`re not really highlighting toads and frogs, but kids always link them with bugs. In the leading paragraph, or down below the fold, be sure to do the same "idea" as you do for kids, but for adult biologists.

"We want kids to know about spiders and flies, insects and snakes. When they grow up, they`ll be the next entomology specialists, teaching entomology to biology students around the world. Insects, roaches, bug sprays, and stopping ants is a big business too. Just because tomorrow`s adults will be stopping roaches or spraying for ants, doesn`t mean they don`t get started appreciating entomology, insects, spiders, ants, butterflies, dragonflies, and all manner of other creeping, crawling, creepy-crawly bugs!"

See? Anyone searching for cockroach sprays should also find your site, even if they didn`t "expect to." :-D


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Craig Landes
---
Defining the undefinable. "There are 10 kinds of people in the world---those who understand binary numbers and those who don`t." - Unknown

International Society of Curmudgeons

What a fantastic thread.  Thanks for starting it creepy, crawly, Seth.  It`s been extremely helpful to me. 

My site launches on Friday and I`m still trying learn all about this SEO business for organic ranking.  My web designer assures me he`s pretty good at it, but I need to edumicate myself on it.  Though some of this is a little Chinese to me, you`ve all provided some really excellent examples and direction to help steer me in a more clear direction.  I didn`t even know the right questions to ask until reading through this.  Everyone starting out with an online business should read this.  Thanks to you all.  You rock!

Tammy

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Tammy Graham, Founder & CEO, True Genius Apparel Company: fitting your personality; www.mytruegenius.com. "You must be the change you wish to see in the world."

Time for me to add my $.02...

I took a look at the code on your home page, and there`s some technical suggestions I would like to make that will also help you.

The javascript in the head section should be placed below the other items in the head section. Basic order should be: doctype (which is already in first position), then meta content type, page title, meta keywords, meta description, then link to style sheet. Running your page through the validator at http://validator.w3.org/ will show you a lot of the things that need correcting. Changing the order that these items appear in your page will push your keywords and title and metas closer to the top of the page, and that`s going to help you. And while search engines do not necessarily use keywords for page placement, these old meta tags DO increase keyword and key phrase density on the page, and that helps a lot. So don`t ever leave them out, they still have a purpose and use.

Validating your page also means you`re more likely to be compatible with lots of browsers besides just Internet Explorer. Your site looks fine in Firefox, so chances are it`s good... but it never hurts to check for the smaller errors. Running your home page through, there are a good number of errors... but a great many of them can be resolved easily--all the non SGML characters are probably apostrophes, hyphens and quotes copied and pasted from an older version of Word (older then Word 2003, that is), just replacing them in Dreamweaver (which your web guy clearly uses from teh javascript in the page) will take care of these.

Next, you have a lot of empty ALT tags.. plus some of your key phrases into these tags. Use those keyphrases one at a time, only repeat the most important one once, but don`t repeat the rest. If you still have empty alt tags when youre done, plug in reasonable words that go with the page, but never leave them empty. You should have list of these keyphrases, and can research some of them here:
http://inventory.overture.com .
Do some looking, there are other places to research as well, but since Overture is now owned by Yahoo and shows the actual phrases that people use, this is a huge help in beginning your research.

Use this site: http://www.ranks.nl/ , the link to the keyword density analyzer, to see how well you`ve optimized your page for content. There are lots of other tools there that are exceedingly useful, too, in researching your keyphrases. Then as CraigL mentions, you need to write your home page content around those phrases, but keep in mind always that you are writing for the user, not the search engine, and the page must be readable and useful.

Someone else already mentioned the page title, this and the viewable page content are the most important items on the page as far as search engines are concerned, so make sure you take the time to do these well.



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Pat Toner Toner Design Website Design & Hosting, Graphic Design, PrePress http://www.tonerdesign.com

OMG! I don`t know where to start. First of all you are all so kind to spend the time to look this deeply into my website. Craig and Donerdesign...wow. I wished I hadn`t had the website built without first consulting with you both. I am taking all this information and these priceless suggestions and will implement them very soon. 

About the same time I started this post I submitted my webiste to a magazine for online businesses called Practical E-Commerce. They have a monthly article called SEO Report Card written by Stephan Spencer of NetConcepts. My website was chosen and www.CoolBugStuff.com will be graded in November`s issue. Based on all your comments I am expecting a D- but I will learn and grow because of all the feedback. Thank you.

Tammy, you are very lucky to have this information, from these great minds, at the start of your website. Good luck to you!

Well, as always...Have a Creepy Crawly Day!

Seth, Bugmaster  

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Have a Creepy Crawly Day!

Seth, Bugmaster
www.CoolBugStuff.com

Different SEO people have different ways of doing things, so your "grade" may not be as bad as you think, but you`re under-utilizing some of the items in your code that could work very well for you. I`d really enjoy seeing the report that you get back, if you would be kind enough to share it--a link to it if it`s online in a public place, or at least some of the items they suggest changing. We`re all learning all the time, and I imagine this would be very helpful for anyone designing their own site.



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Pat Toner Toner Design Website Design & Hosting, Graphic Design, PrePress http://www.tonerdesign.com

Absolutely. I can`t wait for the article to come out. I will post the link to the report the day it arrives.

Seth 

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Have a Creepy Crawly Day!

Seth, Bugmaster
www.CoolBugStuff.com

:-) The thing that`s fun (at least for me) about these threads is that they all have practical application. It`s not just some random thought about whether or not the Republicans or Democrats should change names. When someone asks for advice, help, or has a question, they actually intend to DO something with the response.

As Pat says, it`s not so much about a "grade," like this is some school project. It`s more about advantageous utilization of language. Who cares if you get an A+ for SEO in some magazine? What matters is first, how easy is it to find your site, then how much fun is it to read. After that, how many kids will clamor to go back to see while mom`s cooking dinner? And finally, can you make some money with something from the site.

Pat also has an awesome link on that density analyzer. I wanted to try it but not with Seth`s page, so I chose the TrueGenius home page (not any other pages on the site). Yoikes! The density is all about Genius, True, Apparel, and Genius and True and genius...etc. :-)

But is this a site about IQ? Is it a site about Reality and the ontological meaning of Truth? :-) Of course not!! It`s a site about clothes! (Or "cloze," as we say in the boonies.)

I just want to reiterate the idea that first, a site should be interesting to the human bean who`s reading it and looking at it. The search engine stuff gets you noticed, but you still have to play your song! SEO gets you into the audition; that`s all it does. But you still have to do your own performance.

That being said, too many people approach the site as if the whole world already knows everything about what the site sells. I think people should approach it from the perspective that Nobody has a Clue what the site sells! In fact, they may be from BooFoo Island, and have an interpretor sitting next to them, reading the site and translating it into some Polynesian language!

Watch your assumptions. Does an 8-yearold know what actually is the definition of a "bug?" WE all know, or think we do, but so what? It`s a fascinating problem for practical philosophy, coming under the $64 word of "epistemology"---how do you know what you know.


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Craig Landes
---
Defining the undefinable. "There are 10 kinds of people in the world---those who understand binary numbers and those who don`t." - Unknown

International Society of Curmudgeons

Hi Seth,

It is a tough job to do search engine optimization. Somehow if I can help U to get your website to the top 30 in Yahoo & MSN, do U interested?

Drop me an email, I will show U some samples.

Kerrian
Email: ask@businessnet2u.com

13/Oct/2006  9:49pm (GMT +8:00)