Is Your Site Missing from the Search Engines?
“My site is optimized for the search engines, and it’s not showing up online.”
Yep. I hear this a lot. And unfortunately, I have to tell a lot of entrepreneurs that they just wasted their money.
Maybe you can relate?
Did you just spend a lot of time and money on a search-engine-optimization (SEO) service promising you great exposure online… but you don’t see any results?
Well, I hate to tell you this, but if your site is not showing up on the search engines, it’s NOT optimized!
Now, I know you may have just spent a fortune on this whole process, but it’s time for some tough love…
If your site is not showing up, you need to stop the denial. Review your process and find out what is missing.
Ask yourself these questions.
Did your SEO service:
- Conduct the appropriate research and provide you with a keyword database?
- Use this database to provide different keyword coding on each page of your site?
- Monitor and test various words and phrases to see what works and what doesn’t?
- Update your site content with the appropriate links and headers?
- Provide expertise in writing copy that sells and not just the technical side of things?
When it comes right down to it, your site is only going to show up on the search engines when you
provide value and unique information.
If you use shortcuts or avoid research and monitoring, you are going to waste time and money.
Yes, there are many SEO services out there that will do a great job. But if you want results, look at the
whole picture.
Before moving forward with any SEO service, make sure your tactics include the technical side of things
and the appropriate research, writing and monitoring for best results.
This way, your site will appear on the search engines and your potential customers will be able to find you.
Did you recently optimize your site but with little results? Please let me know here or at www.rembrandtwrites.com.
March 2nd, 2011 at 5:20 am
Your advice here makes perfect sense and now with Google on the witch hunt for duplicate contents, I’d say you start writing ( or hire someone who’ll do write ) something valuable. SEO is not some hoodoo that only a select few has a ’secret’ access to; it’s all about consistency.
March 2nd, 2011 at 8:33 am
Thanks for your nice comments Shaleen. You’re right. It’s still about providing value to your customers. Taking shortcuts just to get noticed by the search engines is not a wise way to go.
Melanie Rembrandt, rembrandtwrites.com
March 7th, 2011 at 11:42 am
great information! have lots of clients who could really use this information!
March 7th, 2011 at 3:38 pm
Thanks Susan! Glad to help.
Melanie, rembrandtwrites.com
March 8th, 2011 at 2:09 pm
Melanie, there is so much more to having a site that ranks well in the search engines than just throwing up a cute website. I also believe that part of the confusion is that often the client will mistake just building the website and placing it out on the Internet to be part of the SEO process.
case in point, my wife has a friend who had someone create a website for her. When I suggested that she allow me to apply some basic SEO techniques to the site to improve the ranking, she said no I already have a webmaster and he has already performed SEO on the site.
virtually every webpage had the same exact page title. None had been optimized to be unique or included any effective keyword phrases. Nor were there any well crafted descriptions on the pages. I really felt bad because she spent a considerable amount of money.
Her site has existed for almost 2 years and still has an Alexa ranking above 8 million. I have a site that I created, because I now want to provide an affordable service for people who are getting Hood-winked. It is just a site where I provide basic do it yourself (DIY) info. It’s only been around since September of 2010 and I expect it to have an Alexa ranking below 500k by the end of its first year.
Any tips for helping potential customers understand that a pretty website doesn’t necessarily equal lots of traffic?
March 8th, 2011 at 2:46 pm
Hi Johnny,
Thanks for your note. If you want to prove to your customers that SEO works, create a landing page for them and then present the results. Start with a small project, or show them what their competitors are doing and what they are missing out on.
Additional articles about this can be found at http://www.startupnation.com/business-blogs/index.php/2011/01/25/web-checklist/, http://www.startupnation.com/business-blogs/index.php/2011/01/11/seo-website-copy/ and on my site at rembrandtwrites.com.
When it comes right down to it, good SEO is a combination of the right keywords and valuable content.
Melanie Rembrandt, rembrandtwrites.com
March 8th, 2011 at 4:02 pm
It’s also worth mentioning Search Engine Optimization, originally, really had nothing to do with, “promising you great exposure online.” It’s really about setting up your site so that it can be easily indexed by search engines. What it has popularly become known as setting up your site to try yo game the system into placing your site high on search results. Google spends a ton of resources ensuring that gaming of the system is very difficult. Melanie, your exactly correct in stating that providing value is really the best strategy.
March 8th, 2011 at 4:06 pm
Thanks Rob. Yes, so many people get overwhelmed with SEO and the process. If you just think about your customers and what they want, and then consider the SEO activities (and not the other way around), that’s the way to go.
Melanie, rembrandtwrites.com
May 25th, 2011 at 1:27 am
It may take several weeks for a new site to be indexed by web crawlers. If you want to know if your SEO efforts are paying off, use free SERP rank checker tools like sitemapdoc.com.