Maybe I was inspired by my own less than perfect SEO work ethic of late or maybe I’m just having a Stevie Nicks moment.
Either way, I have just written a new article on the subject and thought I’d give you all the first read. Let me know what you think!
When It Comes to SEO, Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow
-By Dana Wallert
Search engine optimization or SEO, the very words are enough to make people run screaming from their desks! People are constantly searching for new tricks, shortcuts and quick fixes. When it comes down to it though, like in so many parts of our lives, consistency is key.
When you first build your website, you are excited to get it up on the web. You are anticipating how to handle all the new business that will be generated by thousands and thousands of visitors. Cut to a few weeks later, and you realize that no one is finding you!
Don’t feel defeated by the lack of whirlwind success online. Surely, by the time you have learned enough about website design to get your site going, you have heard that you must utilize a little thing called search engine optimization to be found on Google or Yahoo.
There are many different SEO techniques. A lot of them pop up one day and then are shunned the next. When you’re new to this brave new world of search engine wooing, it’s important to find the most tried and true methods preached by those who have been doing this for years!
The most common methods include on-page optimization or utilizing keywords and meta tags and link strategies. On-page factors do obviously play a big role in how the search engines view your site, but for now I’d like to talk about linking.
Basically, the concept of links when it comes to SEO is simple. The search engines are looking to see who thinks your site has quality content and who gives your website a vote of confidence. There are many schools of thought in the SEO world as to quantity of links versus quality of links, but that too is a discussion for another time.
There are several tried and true methods of attaining all mighty backlinks. One of my favorites is what I’m doing right here, writing articles. Sit down and write an article based on your knowledge of a subject that is related to your website or that would appeal to your website’s target audience. Then, you submit your article to article directories to be picked up and used by webmasters around the globe looking for new content for their websites. The catch being that when they decide to utilize your article, they are required to publish it in its entirety including an “about the author” or author resource box.
Here’s where the linking begins. In most article directories, when you submit your article, you are allowed to include such a resource box complete with a few links back to your website. Once your article packed with quality information and tips is out there and webmasters are posting it right and left, you will soon notice that your website is logging more and more incoming links.
So where am I going with this and how does it relate to the title of this article, “Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow?”
Quite simply put, many online entrepreneurs (sadly myself included), are very eager and ambitious in the beginning. You are writing articles left and right. You are employing new linking strategies and optimizing and re-optimizing your site’s contents for just the right keywords almost daily. You might even start seeing the fruits of your labors there in the first few months.
You may even be getting new customers and jobs from your efforts! Here’s where you, like myself, might find yourself running into a bit of a catch 22 situation. You have put all of your time and energy into online marketing and SEO, and it’s really starting to pay off. Your time and energy are now being refocused on to the daily tasks of your primary business, in my case virtual assistant projects.
You’re business is growing steadily. Each day you think in the middle of all your projects, I should really write another article or freshen up my website. However, far too easily, those secondary tasks fall by the wayside and end up at the very bottom of your to-do list.
Now, you’re 6 or 8 months down the road, and all of a sudden you notice that the traffic to your site seems to be waning. Not as many new customers are contacting you. And worse yet, because you now have time to check on these things again, you see that the number of links to your website is falling and falling fast!
If you’ve been there, you know that though it may sound it, I am not being overly dramatic here. It is not a good feeling at all! You are left throwing your hands up in the air and taking on the prospect of having to start all over again.
Here’s where the “Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow” really comes in. No matter how busy you get or how many new customers are slamming your phone lines and inbox, always remember that those people didn’t come your way without effort on your part!
Don’t let this happen to you! Even if it’s only 1 hour a day, three days a week, you must make time to maintain your search engine optimization efforts. In other words, don’t stop thinking about tomorrow, it will soon be here and with a little effort, it will be better than before!
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