5/21/2010

Google Page Rank Visually Explained

Why Does One Site Rank Higher Than Others?



Google Page Rank is the actual term for the algorithm that determines why your little site ranks where it does and the big guys outrank you.

Wanna Rank Like The Big Guys?
(who doesn't?)

Do What They Do:



Google Page Rank Visually Explained

You wanna be the big red ball (doesn't everybody?)

trouble is your brand new (insignificant) site is that little blue guy...
So, how do you get your tiny little blue guy to grow up to be a big fat red one?

... see all those little purple fellas? they are EXTERNAL sites with YOUR link on them.

how do you get your site to climb in rank?
it has MORE to do with the volume of EXTERNAL sites that link TO YOU, than it does to you fiddling with what's on your little blue site.

OFF page SEO is more important than On page SEO

Now if you elect to ONLY work on ON Site SEO, you *could* get your little blue guy to grow up to be one of those Green guys...

BUT

You ain't never gonna get to be that big fat red one... without a whole bunch of tiny purple ones:

the purple site SUPPORT the main site

Search Engine Optimization in Ft Myers Florida

Reproduction of Wikipedia graphic




Rick Thomas, Social media/SEO Consultant in Ft Myers Florida,Regional Search Engine Marketing For Businesses, Improved Google Search Engine Rankings, Company Facebook Pages Created & Managed, Located in Fort Myers Florida. Yes I am For Hire!

Contact Rick Thomas at 239 896-7020

RickThomas@FtMyersMarketing.com

5/18/2010

Marketing Words Of Wisdom

It's a funny thing how often times a few simple words can inspire hours (or even days) of thought, analysis, and reflection. Since I was a youngster I have been quick to realize that many times a phrase can mean one thing to one person, and something completely different to another, furthermore, there are times when one can hear something said that on the surface is of considerable value, but if examined closer and given sufficient reflection could just be invaluable! I wanted to share this short list of quotes specifically for this reason ... I have found each of these worthy of "sufficient reflection" with regard to the art and industry of marketing ...

" To the place where green vegetables are brought in abundance, bring thine also to sell. "
Babylonian Talmud, Menahot

" Salesmanship is intuitive; it's a personality kind of thing, with maybe a bit of hocus pocus. "
Manny Feris
National Sales Manager, Rambusch Lighting

" A salesman guards his Rolodex more than anything else. It's his meal ticket. "
Richard Jennings
Sales Manager, CardioData Corp.

" Consulting is a business as well as a profession, and you must never lose sight of that. If being businesslike costs you a client or a sale, it is almost certain that the client or sale would not have been worth having. "
Herman Holtz
Government Operations consultant

" Would you persuade, speak of interest, not of reason. "
Benjamin Franklin

" Presenting a professional, upbeat face to the public does wonders for the way people perceive your business. "
Steve Estridge
CEO, Temps & Co.

" The worm lures the fish, not the fisherman and his tackle. "
Angler's maxim

Rick Thomas, Social media/SEO Consultant in Ft Myers Florida,Regional Search Engine Marketing For Businesses, Improved Google Search Engine Rankings, Company Facebook Pages Created & Managed, Located in Fort Myers Florida. Yes I am For Hire!

Contact Rick Thomas at 239 896-7020

RickThomas@FtMyersMarketing.com

5/17/2010

Word of Mouth or Word of Facebook? Marketing On Steroids

I don't like to talk about it ... in fact I'd prefer no one knew at all, but, I'm a closet Farmville fanatic. While it may in fact be a silly little game where people with too much time on their hands have a chance to grow and harvest cartoon crops and animals ... there is another side to it. As it is an interactive game where you acquire neighbors and help each other with your farms you learn quickly that not all neighbors are created equal, there are some you can depend on and some you can't, there are some who are friendly and others who are antagonistic, and perhaps most importantly there are some who you can relate to and trust and actually develop a relationship of value. I have been fortunate enough to have made a number of the latter kind of friends on Facebook, and our friendship has grown from a " see ya when I see ya " kind of thing, to a " don't make plans for Friday because I'm meeting friends on Facebook " kind of thing. What makes it so interesting, and relevant as pertains to this post, is the fact that everyone in the group has some kind of new info, or gripe, warning or advice they want to share with their friends.

Facebook Friends Recommended Products

In the past 3 months we have discussed and encouraged each other to try a multitude of products ranging from Totino's pizza, Little Ceasars, Miller High life, Belks children's clothes, Tire kingdom, Disney ( and hotels in the Orlando Florida area ), and a multitude of other products and services. Additionally ... we have reviewed just about every movie that has come out this year and recommended dozens that are " can't miss " rentals!When we get together online it isn't for the purpose of product review, we are simply sharing with each other the things that we have found make our lives a little easier or nicer and not because we are paid to endorse these things ... because we simply want to help each other!

YOU CAN'T BUY THAT KIND OF ADVERTISING!

When you hear someone talking about Web 2.0 this is what it's all about. This isn't just the future of advertising, it is what is driving sales in America right now! Social media people understand this, it's why we're here, but many businesses seem to have a hard time comprehending the change. It seems clear enough to me that the company's that can adapt their approach to marketing first, and with a clear understanding of what makes their potential clients respond, will be the industry leaders of tomorrow!

Rick Thomas, Social media/SEO Consultant in Ft Myers Florida,Regional Search Engine Marketing For Businesses, Improved Google Search Engine Rankings, Company Facebook Pages Created & Managed, Located in Fort Myers Florida. Yes I am For Hire!

Contact Rick Thomas at 239 896-7020

RickThomas@FtMyersMarketing.com

5/08/2010

Ethics Of SEO

My associates and I have devoted a considerable amount of time over the past several days discussing ethics as pertains to social media and SEO. In any business or industry where the general public knows little or nothing about the inner workings and mechanisms involved it is usually in the best interest of the professionals providing the service to be noticeably above board. We should not only strive to provide a valuable service, but, to educate them as well! The last thing we want to be known as is a charlatan or, even worse, a snake oil salesman ( " pay no attention to the man behind the curtain ... I am THE GREAT AND POWERFUL OZ " )! It is our minimum responsibility to let our clients know what we are able to do for them, how we will go about it, and how long before they begin to see some results. Insofar as they are the ones paying us, it behooves us to endeavor relentlessly on their behalf while staying within the boundaries of ethical propriety. It seems lately though those once well defined boundary lines have become expansive gray area's, and the subject of much discussion.
In social media circles the terms white hat, black hat, and gray hat SEO are a topic one can expect to hear much debate and discussion over. Black hat SEO refers to programs that manipulate the way a website is read or perceived by search engine crawlers ( programs search engines such as google use to quantify, among other things, the content, traffic, and in and outbound links to a website ), violate the rules and regulations of the search engine, or alter content on a website intending to mislead a consumer. The penalties for the use of these tactics can be quite severe so most social media pros steer well clear of them. The term white hat SEO refers to practices that are, for the most part, universally accepted as being fair, honest, and above board, such as optimal use of keywords and key phrases, updating and evaluating headline links, and the optimization of HTML. Then we have the gray area ... the subject I hear the most discussion over in the gray area is ghost writing and ad copy:

There are 2 sides to this debate and they both make good points. One side supports the idea that when a consumer reads an article on a web page or blog post they expect it to be in the words of the CEO, owner, or at least a full time employee of the business they are reading about, and that to have an outside entity write it is misleading at best, and sometimes downright dishonest! On the other side of the debate is the faction that asserts that given that they are being paid by the company to write the article, that they have both personal knowledge of and a personal relationship with the CEO or owner, that they are in fact communicating the thoughts and concerns of the principals involved. The jury is still out on this discussion and is likely to stay that way.

As for my thoughts on the matter ... in a successful ongoing business everyone in every position generally has his hands full already, readable ad copy is the product of hard work, knowledge, and devoting an appropriate amount of quality time to produce it. It would be unreasonable to only allow blogs, press releases, and ads under the circumstances that they were written by owners who were english lit majors ... and it would be even more unreasonable to expect clients to read product from those who can't write!
Rick Thomas, Social media/SEO Consultant in Ft Myers Florida,Regional Search Engine Marketing For Businesses, Improved Google Search Engine Rankings, Company Facebook Pages Created & Managed, Located in Fort Myers Florida. Yes I am For Hire!

Contact Rick Thomas at 239 896-7020

RickThomas@FtMyersMarketing.com

Conventional Marketing Gone The Way Of The Dinosaur

The light finally went on for me several months ago ... everything I know about conventional marketing is quickly going the way of the dinosaur. Over the past 3 decades I have been the owner of two construction company's, a Tae Kwon Do school, spent four years as a Realtor, served as a manager for South Florida Gas Company, a District Sales Manager for The Washington Times, in addition to managing crews for a number of SW Florida businesses. In those days marketing, for most local businesses, centered around ad copy, layout, yellow page and newspaper ads, cold calls, and flyers. Today the effectiveness of these methods of advertising has become increasingly suspect! Newspaper sales and subscriptions are down and publishers are scrambling to find their niche in social media, cold calls are blocked and flyers are thrown out without so much as a glance, and the yellow pages now play second fiddle to " Googling it "! People are twittering about the restaurants in town, and nobody is going to shell out forty bucks for a movie when his Farmville buddies told him it was awful! The writing is on the wall, social media will be a major determining factor in the success of most businesses for the foreseeable future!
It was overwhelmingly evident to me that this was an industry I wanted to be a part of! I immediately started researching the field and seeking out mentors. My first big surprise was the extent to which the professionals in this arena reach out to help a newcomer. It took no time at all before I had a number of experienced allies with whom I could question, learn, and network with. I quickly learned several key points ... social media consultants and SEO consultants, while related and intertwined quite closely, work toward the same end result from different angles because their trades, are in fact, two separate disciplines. I have been quite pleased to note that as a group they acknowledge a moral and fiduciary obligation to operate with a high degree of ethics with regard to their clients, and in spite of the fiercely competitive nature of the business, work closely together and maintain a high ethical standard amongst themselves as well. I'm going to love this business!


Yes I am For Hire!

Contact Rick Thomas at 239 896-7020


Rick Thomas, Social media/SEO Consultant in Ft Myers Florida,Regional Search Engine Marketing For Businesses, Improved Google Search Engine Rankings, Company Facebook Pages Created & Managed, Located in Fort Myers Florida. Yes I am For Hire!

Contact Rick Thomas at 239 896-7020

RickThomas@FtMyersMarketing.com

Rick Thomas Social media SEO consultant

Social media, SEO, Advertising



Search engine optimization is an industry all about perpetual change. Internet technology was created by, and has always been in a state of refinement by some of the best and brightest minds in the world. A huge part of what an SEO consultant does is keep up with these advances. The "latest and greatest" trend sweeping the world right now are the smart phones. They are on the verge of becoming a dominant force in marketing! Smart phone users can access the internet from anywhere at any time, if they are on the road and need a product or service they can "Google it" no matter where they are. The catch is, for the time being, organic search results are not currently available on the smart phones, only the top 3 highest ranked in Google maps are visible!

Organic search results are determined by Google's algorithm, which considers many factors pertaining to your web site such as inbound links, traffic, relevant content, and many more factors that get a lot of attention, but, one factor that seems to fly under the radar is THE LENGTH OF TIME YOUR WEBSITE HAS RANKED AT THE TOP. The real unit of measure is trust, if you have been at the top for years, it appears Google perceives this as testimony of your businesses trustworthiness. For an SEO firm it is a tough task to dislodge a competitor who has dominated his local market for a long time. The same appears to hold true for ranking in Google maps.

For some reason, many customers have the impression that a listing in Google maps is not subject to manipulation by businesses (i.e. SEO professionals), therefore, a reliable sign of who is the most popular, reliable or affordable. The truth is Google maps can be optimized the same as organic search results! Right now there are few SEO consultants providing improved ranking in Google maps ... very few! Don't let your competitors become firmly ensconced in this important niche of internet marketing, it appears it could well be the wave of the future!

Google Page Rank Visually Explained

Rick Thomas, Social media/SEO Consultant in Ft Myers Florida,Regional Search Engine Marketing For Businesses, Improved Google Search Engine Rankings, Company Facebook Pages Created & Managed, Located in Fort Myers Florida. Yes I am For Hire!

Contact Rick Thomas at 239 896-7020

RickThomas@FtMyersMarketing.com