Posts

Posted on

SEO and Blogs A Dead Issue?

I think not, however the world of blogs and SEO has definitely changed in a big way just this past several weeks.

It used to be that linking to your website by posting on other blogs in the blog comments was a great way to get quality inbound links. But not anymore! Blogger, WordPress and Typepad now automatically with no override control blog search engines from spidering links that you place in comments by including a no follow tag. Don’t confuse this with links in posts, it is just comments that are affected this way.

So what exactly does this mean, are blogs no longer great for SEO? No blogs are still great tools for SEO but the focus needs to change. Here are my top tips:

  1. Don’t waste time posting comments on other blogs to get links back to your site or blog. This strategy no longer works.
  2. Do blog on your own site. Use keyword dense posts and informational content to build the quality of your website and blog overall.
  3. Do heavily link your blog into your website and vice versa.
  4. Do include a site search engine on your website and use WordPress or Blogger custom FTP to allow your blog posts to be spidered as search result content for your website and blog.
  5. If you use WordPress make sure to add the module that allows you to have a meta description, keywords, and social bookmarking tags.
  6. Use social bookmarking tools to help push your site and encourage interaction and sharing. This may very well be the push that replaces commenting on other blogs and pointing back to your site and blog.
  7. Do create relationships with other bloggers in your field to do cross linking IN POSTS not comments to your site. You both will benefit as long as you are not competitors. The creation of some of these strategic partnerships will allow you to have guest authors and a network of interlinked sites for better overall performance.

So is blogging for SEO dead? Not hardly, it has just changed significantly.

Posted on

Typepad Using No Follow Link Code By Default

If you have been posting to blogs on Blogger or Typepad thinking that you were getting a great inbound link to your website. Know that in addition to Blogger (we posted about this previously) now Typepad inserts a rel=”no follow” command in the code to all links in comments.

So don’t waste your time trying to raise your link numbers or organic positions by posting to blogs now. You can still post to mine, I love to hear your comments, but mine is a Blogger blog so you won’t get any flow through benefit to your site just as you now will not on Typepad blogs.

What about WordPress? Is this the same situation? Just checked one of the blogs we work on and here’s the source code on the link rel=’external nofollow‘ so same situation in WordPress.

That does not mean if when you blog your links are set up as no follows, jut the links that are left in comments!

Posted on

Are Link Strategies Dead?

I have never really liked doing link programs. If you yourself have never worked a link program and I mean really getting your hands dirty with it, not farming it out to India, you would not understand just how awfully difficult it actually is to get quality inbound links. It is even harder to get inbound links on request without paying for them.

In the real world of getting links, and I mean the real world not using a link farm tool or a reciprocal link exchange database, the contact and followup is hugely time consuming. The results are spotty to be kind and typically of poor quality and response average is miserable. I evaluated a link program done by another firm recently for a skeptical client. They had been billed $800 a month for more than a six month period and had received under ten links to their website.

I believe that a far better approach is to write excellent content, optimize your website properly, have a blog, do a regular e-newsletter, and if you really feel you must, write free articles for article sites that include a link back to you in the footer. I have been able to get placement for sites on Google and the other search engines for myself and clients without link programs.

Does that mean that people don’t link to my site, no, people will link to sites that provide valuable information, freebies, whitepapers, and content that enriches their own visitor’s experience. So stop wasting money and resources on link programs, get back to basics working your site. Make it the best it and can be and start providing valuable information that will really help people not just information on what you personally sell.