Google’s Matt Cutts Warns Against Buying Links (Way Back in 2007)

With Google’s Penguin update, the search engine makes good on Matt Cutts’ 2007 statement that sites that purchase links may be penalized more in the future.

Although we had a strong root domain, there weren’t any links going back to any of the pages associated with Core’s services. Because it was essentially a new site, we had very poor (even nonexistent) rankings and no links in place. For our main keyword, “small business web design,” when I first started link building, we weren’t showing in the top 80 pages.

Yes, we fell below the first 800 results for our main keyword in Google. Not exactly a situation any business wants to find itself in.

With our $500 a month budget and five to ten hours a month to spend building links for the web design division’s site, 10 months later, we’re on the top of page two for our main keyword and appearing in the top three results for our secondary keyword, “small business web design company.”  We’ve also seen an increase in traffic ranging from 6 to 10 times as many visits as we did prior to starting our marketing efforts.

Wondering how we did it on a small budget and minimal hours invested each month?

For starters, Core’s website had a pretty hefty advantage when I started building links because we already were associated with a well performing domain that was being updated regularly. We were also doing link building for 352media.com, so both of these factors gave us a big leg up over a website starting from scratch.

Over the last ten months, I’ve also been taking a steady approach to link building, adding our site to industry specific directories; writing press releases as needed for company events or milestones; and focusing heavily on guest blog posts for web design and digital marketing sites. In those ten hours each month, I spent an average of one hour writing a press release when needed, three hours directory linking, and the rest of the time writing content to appear on a myriad of digital marketing websites.

Content creation has been a big part of the overall SEO strategy, and there is no shortage of websites looking to add new content to their blogs. Joining a service like Blogger Link Up has given me a huge advantage in finding sources of content, and I’ve found the sources to be incredibly receptive to the articles I’ve written.

The biggest turning point in our rankings rise happened after our design director, Daniel, had three hugely successful blog posts published on Mashable. This, in addition to guest posts I wrote, added a great 1,2 punch to our link building strategy and brought tons of new traffic to our website.

You can see from the image below the increase in traffic we’ve received over the past ten months (the large spikes coming when our guest posts on Mashable went live).

Of course, I can’t take all of the credit for the success we’ve seen as I’ve had our designers contribute blog posts and I’ve had suggestions and input from other members of our marketing team. But, if I was able to increase our rankings from page 80 to page 2 in under a year with less than ten hours a month, imagine the impact this sort of long-term marketing could have on your business.

Important details:

• I am only competing for google Australia. The products will only be sold locally.
• The competition for non-web or finance related keywords is considerably less. In fact after this experience I think future projects will focus on niche’s outside web and finance, which traditionally I have focused on.
• This is part 1 of the case study, getting the home page ranked. When I have achieved success I will write another case study on getting inner pages ranked.

So whilst I have already talked poorly of more accomplishments, its important to note, that these results were achieved with a budget of less than $150 in less than 2 months. Initially, I was going to hire someone for my SEO and had quotes ranging from $750 to $2500 for top 10 results within 6 months (perhaps I should offer SEO services???). Without the expectation of instant success I will be forced to try to remember the individual steps and thier details, and as such the information will not be exact.

My Greatest Mistake

Ever done a big project or assignment and realised you have done all this work on a false premise? I can not stress the importance of getting fundamentals right onine and in life. Its like building a house on sand (ref: Jesus), with incorrect foundations, the house is doomed for failure.

Unfortunately for me you may learn from my mistakes (this happens a lot). The fundamental of SEO is targetting the correct keywords. Ones with traffic, little competition, and an ability to convert. During my keyword research phase, I mistakenly forgot to search using [exact] terms on Adwords suggestion tool. The result being I was using traffic figures for broad terms instead.

If you are unsure what this means I will provide an example. Lets use Dog Food as the keyword. When you use the [exact] search on adwords, google will let you know how many people typed just “dog food” in thier search engine. If you use the [broad] search in adwords, the results will include every single search that included “dog food”. So when someone searches “best dog food”, “good dog food” or something off topic, such as “people eating dog food videos” they are all included in the number of searches.

As you can see, you would get a wildly inflated result which is exactly what happened to me. After picking my major keyword, buying a domain that included the key word, I realised my folly and the search term that the site is now named after is barely used.

The Domain

Despite it being a poorly chosen keyword, I have used it as my domain name. If your site is new, choosing a domain name with the target keywords in there is a great head start. Search engines love keyword rich domain names and its not really a surprise that they do. Webmasters can’t cheat, or lie with a domain name, and its a fairly safe bet that the content will match the domain. Despite my domain keyword phrase being obsolete, the keywords within that phrase are used extensively for my site. I regitered my domain for the longest period possible (5 years) because it gives authority and longevity to your site in the eyes of the search engines.

The Placeholder

The site was still under construction, but I wanted to let the search engines know about the site as soon as possible. I created a simple html page, with a little bit of content including the keywords for the site. I then linked to this placeholder from scribblescratch (a strong PR5) and the site was indexed within 24 hours. Obviously it may be hard for a strong pr5 link to your site, but any established site will do, the link from Scribble Scratch is hardly related, and has no context, so despite being a PR5 it would be pretty worthless for rankings.

The Blog

Knowing the difficulty that ecommerce sites face for rankings I knew I would have to give the site an extra dimension and adding a blog is both easy and crack for search engines. As with new blogs I did the very basic, but neccessary steps in optimizing this new blog. I added sites to ping, fixed up the permalinks, added all in one SEO plugin and created a site map. Then I simply added a few simple blog post per week

Getting Links

Then comes the fun part getting links for your site. Being a busy person, who hates monotonous task, I was always going to buy my links in some fashion. I decided to be cautious I would first optimise the blog (you will find out later my main reason), and also because the blog links back to the main site with my keyword. I used the services section of DP and found a service wehere they would write a post, spin it and publish it on thier network of blogs (over 100 from memory). I think this cost me $30.

I then hired 3 seperate people (all from DP) to do manual directory submissions. They cost roughly $10-$20 each, and had them focused on quality over quantity. I used 3 different people to get a nicer mix of directories then if I had chosen the same person for three different keywords. Two of these pointed directly to the main site, while the other pointed to the blog.

I then purchased an article writer, spinner and submission service. I think it was one article to 50 directories. This service cost me $25. At this stage all of my keywords were ranking, albeit only in the top 100, but just seeing the site in google gave me hope.

After about a week or so, I then purchased a link wheel, profile link service. Basically it was 6,000+ links for $25. Although the links don’t seem to show up in site explorer, within a couple of days my rankings were all in the top 20. Again I found this service through DP, but fiverr or warriorforum are great places to find these types of services. Within a few more days, my keywords were in the top 10.

The site completed

Somewhere around this stage, the website design and installation was completed. Although the on-page SEO factors had changed little (or possibly even got a little worse) the site was actually user-friendly. As I use analytics, I think this plays a part in googles algorithms as google wants to give relevant results. Whats more relevant, a site with a bounce rate of 90% or a site with strong user interaction? With the ecommerce site up, users stayed far longer, visited more pages, and the bounce rate went down to 30%, at the same time my rankings also rose. Coincidence perhaps, but logic suggest otherwise.

Back to Links

Now the reason I optimised the blog earlier on was for the introduction of smart links plugin. Basically it automatically links keyword to any page you chose. (read this for more). Anyway after getting about a dozen posts published I activated the plugin, with my keywords straight to my ecommerce site. I also purchased 2 blog post on fashion blogs (I got them to write, you can save money by writing them yourself) for about $20. I chose blog post over blog links, because they are cheaper, they are more contextual, you can ususally have up to three keyphrases, and most importantly they are permanent.

The Result

I have been trying to rank for four keywords.

First Keyword (most important): Rank #2
Second Keyword (low traffic but high coversions): Rank #1 and #2 (the blog is the number 2 spot)
Third Keyword: Rank # 7
Fourth Keyword: Rank #9

Total Cost:

Blog Network; $30
Directory Submissions: $35
Article Submission: $30
Profile Links/Wheel: $25
Smart Links: Free
Blog Post: $20

Total: $140

Total Time:

The domain was registered on 9th of february and the results achieved on the 4th of April.

So why is SEO smartlinks the best SEO plugin for wordpress? For a start it has SEO in the name, which means its good, right? Then you add the word smart, and your being stupid not to use it. And then BAM, links comes next, which are great for SEO. If this was a court of law I would rest my case, but being the court of public opinion I will expand my arguments to satisfy the minority of you who would like some actual information.

SEO smart links is designed to interlink within your post and pages, an important and grossly under-utilised SEO component. It uses specified keywords, titles, tags and meta tags of your post and then links from other post with those keywords as anchor text, all done automatically. For a blog with a lot of content that alone is gold.

But for me the real beauty of this plugin is to specify keywords, and designate pages manually. If you have a money page, or a landing page of some sort, that you want to rank well in the search engines, you can aim as many links as possible to the page, all completely natural and with great content weight. But like the at-home shopping network says, “but wait, theres more” and for SEO smart links, its the ability to link to external webpages. There are so many ways this can be utilized and because the links are so natural, so keyword specific, and located in great content, they really are the perfect links given great weight by the search engines.

If after reading this, the unimaginative few of you, cant comprehend the opportunity of this great little plugin, I will expand your limited IQ (are bloggers suppossed to insult their readers? I will have to leave that tough, tough question to the philophers and ethicist) and list my 5 favorite uses of the SEO smartlinks plugin.

1. Interlinking

I suppose I should include the reason of its existence, and on really large blogs in particular this is a spectacular bonus to get long tailed rankings for many of your post. The fact it can be completely automated as well, and the linking system is high quality coding, adds to the plugins desirability.

2. Site and Blog

This is how I currently use this plugin. On a business site, I started an adjacent blog at www.theiste.com/blog/, then did some cheap SEO on the blog and write a few post a week for the business. The business gets authority, the search engines get extra content, and the main site gets in content, one-way, keyword-specific links. It has worked really well, let me tell you.

3. Blog and Site

Similar to the last one, (not just the title), but the site is external. I will be doing this soon with this blog, and my new web design site. Basically use an external blog (hopefully of the same niche) and link target keywords back to your site. Much better than a simple blogroll link, plus you can target several keywords.

4. Buy links on external blogs

Whilst there is no defined market for this, there is a good chance if you approach a decent blog in your field and get them to install the plugin on your behalf, for a few pieces of gold and silver, that they will do it. After all it barely affects them, or thier blog in any way. Depending on the blog you may be able to score dozens of high ranked contextual links to your site, particularly if they have a hefty archive.

5. Buy related Blogs

The last is to simply buy related blogs, preferably with a decent history. If the blog makes no money you can probably pick it up very cheap, and depending on how well it relates to your site, there may be quite a few natural one-way links heading your way. This method would be much cheaper then buying blog post, and also a good way to mix the age of the pages with links pinting to your site.

To sum up, if you don’t have it, get it. Let us know what you think in the comments below.

The Ultimate Search Engine Loophole Review

What Is It

The Ultimate Search Engine Loophole, is a guide to a literal loophole in the MSN/Bing Search engines, claiming to get you number 1 rankings for simple one page websites for whatever keywords you aim for.

My Opinion

I gave this product a 1 and that is only because I honestly believe it once worked. Firstly as its own name suggest it capitalized on a loophole for the MSN/Bing search engine, and like most loopholes it was closed down.

But worse than that is the type of investment needed to fully test/use the system, none of which was mentioned before purchase. 10-20 domains, a host with several C-class Ip’s, and 5-6 upsells which are critical to using the product effectively and efficiently, easily another $500 on top of the purchase price.

And there is just no positives to mention, there is not even any decent tips within that can be applied elsewhere, it is literally a guide to a single loophole, which doesn’t work and cost deceptively more than the original purchase price to test.

The Good

• Seriously can’t think of one, other than it use to work.

The Bad

• Doesn’t work, the “loophole” has been closed
• Sales page does not mention the extra cost involved to set up the system, including heaps of software upsells that should be included in the original purchase (they are critical to the system)

The Experiment

Now I pride myself on effectively testing the systems and posting proof of my results. After the initial hidden extra cost involved, I no longer felt like throwing my resources towards the product.

I did however do a small-scale test (which the ebook suggested would be sufficient), and had absolutely no positive results. I found anecdotal evidence all across the web that the product no longer works anyway because of changes made to the Bing/msn search engine and decided that between this evidence and the fact that the product is dodgy as hell ($500+ in hidden cost) I would proceed no further.

Visit The Ultimate Search Engine Loophole Home Page

So in an attempt to enlighten new and old webmasters alike I have decided to not re-invent the wheel and instead compile a directory of valuable SEO links where you can learn everything you need for SEO.

General (all encompassing)

All you need to know about SEO – Nice blog post on DP by Dan Shultz a very experienced webmaster. Covers pretty much everything about SEO including the how and why as opposed to just the what.

FAQ: Search Engine Optimization – Another excellent blog post this time on Sitepoint by one of their most experienced members Stymiee. A simple FAQ to answer all the question you may have about SEO

Keyword Analysis

Competitive Keyword Analysis – Choosing keywords can be one of the most important aspects of SEO. This thread at Sitepoint is a good discussion on the various methods and their importance.

On Page Optimisation

On page Optimisation – An Introductory Guide – A great post on SEOchat providing in depth information on all the aspects of SEO you can control on your site.

On Page Optimisation – A complete Walk through – Another comprehensive article on all the aspects of on page optimisation.

Off Page Optimisation

SEO Link Building – A very comprehensive post into link building by the guys at SEO chat forum. Lots of background information allowing you to understand best methods and practices and apply them today.

101 ways to build link popularity – This is one of the first resources I can remember reading online and it is still as good today as it was before. As the title suggest it provides 101 ideas and strategies to build links to your site.

Misc

Optimize a single blog post – Probloggers Darren Rowse shares his secrets on getting individual post (pages) to rank well. If you just want some SEO knowledge to get a few more visitors this is the resource I would recommend first.

List of best SEO Tools – There are a large number of SEO tools available that make your SEO efforts much easier. They range from automated links to keyword research and the guys at Smashing Magazine have done a nice list of the best ones available.

SEO Plugins every wordpress blog should have – Another great post at Problogger outlining for those wordpress bloggers out there the easiest way to improve your SEO via some of the great plugins available.

If you have any other resources which you think will be helpful please let me know in the comments below.