After blogging for over three years I have learned a lot of things about search engine marketing and keyword ranking. And one of the things that I have learned is that it really doesn’t take a lot of content to rank for keywords in Google. Granted, there are a lot of contributing factors towards ranking for keywords, but I am finding that the amount of content written doesn’t really hold too much weight in the equation.

Content adds quality to a page. It adds value, and typically, it provides people with what they are looking for. I believe that that is what Google and other search engines seek. They seek, index, and rank pages that they feel will be important to people. In doing so, that makes their search engine favorable because people find what they need. So, in most cases, as a publisher, writing content is what’s needed to achieve ranking. But the question remains, “How much content is needed?” Many publishers feel like a lot is required, when in many cases, it’s not.

A large amount of content isn’t always necessary to achieve ranking. Content is very important, but publishers should be aware that thousands of words on a page isn’t always required to achieve keyword ranking. The point I’m aiming to get across here is that writing content is difficult, takes a lot of time, and requires a lot effort. So, putting in more resources than what’s needed is a waste. With many jobs, it’s the duty of managers to control costs and expenses, to manage payroll and control hours, and oversee that excessive materials are not being used to complete the job.

The same should apply with content writing and search engine ranking. Don’t assume that content is always “King” when it comes to targeting keywords in Google and other search engines. I have learned that the “King” is with identifying alternative keywords and phrases that have low levels of competition with high search counts. The second part is identifying what it will take to rank above the existing competition on the search result page.

When you have it set in your mind that you want rank for certain keywords and phrases, take time to study your competition on the search results page. Ask yourself, “How did they rank for this keyword?” and investigate. Once you discover how your competition achieved their ranking, then you will have a better idea of knowing how much of your own resources you’ll need to use towards ranking above them.

My point is this: The amount of content is only a small factorization in the equation of search engine ranking. Content is much like butter on toast, milk in cereal, or sugar in coffee. Content really only adds flavor to a page. And with keyword ranking, it’s your job to figure out the ingredients needed to make toast, cereal, and coffee. After you do that, then you’ll know exactly how much butter, milk, and suger to add.

Almost once week I receive an email from a writer explaining that they can provide excellent content that will allow me to rank well in search engines. I am always open minded to evaluating what can be produce, so when I receive email from a writers trying to pitch their service, I typically respond back asking to have a 75 to 100 word example of their work sent to me.

Recently I was contacted by a writer and I asked the writer to provide me with a sample based around the keyword phrase “Cheap Bottled Water.” When I received the email back, my observations motivated me to write this post. Here is a copy of the content that was provided to me.

Cheap Bottled Water

Most people have turned to bottled water as an alternative to tap water since they think it is safer. Cheap bottled water has become a popular item in many people’s shopping carts. However, make sure that the cheap bottled water is up to the set standards before consuming it. There is cheap bottled water from various stores at comparable prices. Remember cheap bottled water may not be ultimately healthy compared to tap water.

Most people think that writing for search engines is nothing more then packing keywords into the writing. In the case of the writer who provided me with this sample above, he felt like he had to use the phrase, “cheap bottled water” constantly, and in fact, he did so almost in every sentence.

Search engines don’t like unnatural writing. The content provided to me was very unnatural. It was clearly and obviously written in a way to trick search engines. There was no pure and inner quality within the work. It was totally superficial and it will not do anything for the end user. In other words, and to put it bluntly, the content was garbage.

So the lesson to learn is when writing content for the purpose of ranking in search engines, there’s more involved than just stuffing keywords. In fact, stuffing keywords isn’t good at all. My advice to you if you are trying to write content for search engines, simply write about the topic at hand in a natural way. Write your copy in a way that is understandable to others, as if you were writing a letter to a friend.

Allow search engines to index the content, and then take some time to study results. Observe and make notes of the different keywords you’re ranking for. Also observe whether you’re ranking for the keywords you intended for. If results are less than what you desire, consider making some changes by editing or re-wording your content and possibly adding more rich content to the page.

If you’re looking to get some excellent search engine marketing tips, there’s obviously quite a few sites online that provide them. One site in particular has captured my attention. Recently, I discovered a search engine marketing company in Houston called, Search Engine Marketing Group.

The company was formed in 2006 by Gerald Weber, who happens to be an avid reader of SeoHosting.com Blog. The company started out as a web design business; However, when the needs for professional search engine marketing and optimization services increased over time, Gerald and his team adapted to the demands of business.

Quickly the group grew to be one of the leading search engine marketing companies in the city of Houston. Consequently – and in addition to providing some of the most top notch and professional search engine marketing services in their city - their group also sports one of the hottest blogs covering the topic of search engine marketing and SEO tips.

I discovered the blog recently after getting a trackback notification on a previous article I published on SeoHosting.com. It seems that Gerald had some opinions that differed from mine and he felt compelled to share them on their company blog. It’s a good thing that he did though, otherwise who knows how long it would have been before I would have discovered the site.

That said, if you’re looking for some excellent and practical tips on search engine marketing, I would definitely recommend checking out Gerald’s SEM/SEO blog. A lot of hard work goes into the articles being published and as always, the information and education is totally free.

Some of the more recent tips include information on how to reduce StumbleUpon message spam, how to become a Digg power user, and how to make WordPress more secure. Be sure to check the blog out and connect with them by subscribing their RSS feed.

In my previous article about teaching how to research and target keywords, I explained about the importance of targeting keywords that generate qualified traffic. Now that you have an understanding of why it’s important to rank for relevant keywords as opposed to focusing on scoring tons of traffic, let’s take a closer look at two programs offered by Google that can help you drill down and find keywords that you can rank for on your site.

Keep in mind, it’s important for you to have some kind of web publishing system on your site, such as a blog, and someone who is able to write and publish content on it. For more details about this, I suggest reading my article that explains why a blog is important for SEO. That said, the two programs that we’ll take a closer look at are called Google AdWords Keyword Tool and Google Wonder Wheel.

As mentioned prior, the Google Wonder Wheel an amazing and free service that allows you to easily drill down into discovering relevant longtail keywords based off very popular and competitive ones. It’s handy to use this program so that you can gather a list of keywords that will potentially be used.

The next program, Google AdWords Keyword Tool, is used to further research the list of keywords generated from Google Wonder Wheel. Using this program, you can get a general idea of the amount of traffic and level of competition a keyword has.

Using Google AdWords Keyword Tool gives you the ability to screen your preliminary list of keywords so that you can remove ones that prove to be too competitive or receive far less traffic than desired. Also, Google AdWords Keyword Tool works as a micro keyword finder as well. Just like Google Wonder Wheel, you’ll find that the keyword tool does a great job generating relevant keywords as well.

Stay tuned because in the next few days I will continue explaining more about researching and targeting keywords for search engine marketing. Next, I will show you how to study the search results page to determine whether it’s possible to easily rank on it.

Learning how to research and target keywords for search engine marketing is a valuable skill to learn. Ranking for certain keywords and phrases in search engines can deliver more traffic to your site than you can shake a stick at. But also, it isn’t always about the quantity of traffic.

In most cases, it’s about the quality of the traffic. And that is one of the most common things I believe people mistake about SEM and even SEO. In my opinion, I would rather have 100 super qualified visitors to my site per month rather than 10,000 unqualified visitors. That said, of course you can easily rank for many different keywords and phrases; however, if you own a site that sells kitchen appliances in Dallas Texas. Is there really any reason to try to rank for the search term, kitchen appliances in Alaska?

In other words, it’s relatively easy to rank for keywords and phrases that yield a lot of traffic. But, this is useless traffic that only puts a burden on your server and consumes your bandwidth. Not only is this traffic not going to convert, but eventually search engines will catch on to the misuse of keyword targeting and derank the listings and possibly the entire site.

The best thing a site owner can do is pick out relevant keywords and phrases that will deliver high quality traffic and qualified leads towards conversion or call to action. With that, here is a simple process you can follow that will help you drill down towards finding keywords that’ll work for you.

The first thing I do is write down ten primary keywords, such as: Cars, Doctor, Computer, House, Keyboard, Bed, Door, Plants, etc. Once I have a list of primary keywords that are relevant to the topic of my site, I then start researching sub-topics, or as many people call it, Longtail Keyword Phrases. There’s quite a few programs that can help you do this. One is a program I have been using for a couple years called Google AdWords Keyword Tool. The other is a newer program, also offered by Google, called Google Wonder Wheel. Using both, will in fact, help you quite a bit.

In my next article I will show you how to use both of these programs to find keywords to use towards targeting qualified traffic to your site. If you haven’t already done so, I suggest subscribing to my RSS feed so that you won’t miss my next article. Also, I suggest subscribing to the main RSS Feed so that you don’t miss articles written by my fellow writers here on SEOHosting.com.

In the business of search engine marketing, choosing the correct keywords to target is crucial towards the overall success in your online business. The folks who use Pay Per Click services, such as the Google AdWords program, their overall success depends on bidding on the right keywords. For search engine marketers who target organic keywords, the same process is involved; however, instead of bidding for keywords are you rolling the dice on whether you can rank for the keywords you target. Both aspects of search engine marketing have their pro’s and con’s and both equally have their share of stresses.

In my business of search engine marketing, I don’t fool around too much with Pay Per Click. I focus on organic search. The two primary reasons why I focus on organic search versus pay per click is because I am very good at it and secondly I have something to show for my work after it is done. With Pay Per Click, once your campaign money expires so does your listings in the search engines. With organic search, I have an endless amount of free traffic for as long as my keywords continue to be ranked in the search engine.

With all that said, I want to show you an example of how I choose keywords to target in the organic search section of search engines, mainly Google.

I have used quite a few tools in the past to help me do keyword research. Over time, the Google AdWords Keyword Tool has grown on me. It is my favorite tool to use and it is free. In the examples in this article, I will be using this tool. If you have never used the Google AdWords keyword tool for researching keywords, you should give it a try. I think you’ll enjoy it. Let’s roll through a few examples of how I find keywords to target.

Nike

Nike is a very popular brand of shoes. It is very unlikely that I would be successful ranking well in Google for the search term: Nike. Granted, it could be done, but it would take a ton of work in order to pull it off. Needless to say, the amount of time and energy I would have to invest towards ranking for the term Nike I could instead use that towards ranking for about 20 other keyword phrases instead.

Google AdWords Keyword Tool Results For Nike:

[Click to view full size]

Looking at the above screen shot you will see that Nike generates over 13 million searches in Google each month. Ranking #1 on the Nike page in Google would be a total dream. Like I said, anything is possible, but with the amount of time and energy needed to do so, it might not be worth it. Instead, I use my time and energy to rank for longtail keywords.

Longtail keywords are keyword phrases that have a much lower level of competition while also having a decent amount of monthly searches. Longtail keywords are also keyword phrases that are much easier to rank well in Google.

Longtail Keywords For Nike

Here are some examples of longtail Nike keywords that I would target.

• Nike Shoe Sales
• Nike Shoes on Sale
• Nike Shoe Deals
• Nike Shoe Clearance
• Kids Nike Shoes
• Mens Nike Shoes
• Nike Baseball Cleats
• Nike Football Cleats

I would write blog posts using these keyword phrases as post titles. From there, I would make sure that the first paragraph of the post included the title phrase, and then I would make sure the entire article include proper alt text and images all with the post title name. Once the content is indexed, it is very likely that the page will rank well. If it doesn’t then you will have to do a little link building, no big deal. The point is that the amount of time and energy invested into ranking for longtail keywords are much less than trying to go for primary keywords. Also, most all attempts to aim for mainstream keywords end in failure.

One of the main reasons why I target longtail keywords over mainstream keywords is because I feel it is better to rank on the top ten for a keyword phrase that has only 1000 searches per month compared to ranking on the second page (results 11 through 20) for a keyword phrase that receives 10,000. Not very many people investigate the links on page two.

I hope that you enjoyed reading this article. What are some other ways you research longtail keywords? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

As a blogger, often I find myself staring at a blank white screen, wondering what I should write about. My job as an author is to write content that I monetize towards earning money online. The tools I use are simple. I need a tool that enables me to discover which keywords are profitable. The Google AdWords Keyword Tool is a great example. The second tool is I need a platform to use to publish my writing on line. WordPress is a great example. Inside of that, of course, there are a few other tools needed in my business, but overall I just need to know what is keywords are hot and I need a an online word processor. But what happens when I have that terrible case of writers block?

From time to time though, I sit here staring at that blank white screen. I have writers block. And as a writer, that can be a very scary thing. Over time I have learned how to deal with what I call search engine marketer’s writers block, and I want to share with you one of the solutions I have created towards dealing with it. The solution is so simply, you will kick yourself for not thinking about it on your own.

So here is what I do to eliminate writers block. I ask people what advice do they need. How can I help you? What can I help you with? In short, I open up my email inbox, open up my instant messenger profiles, and open my social networking profiles to the public and I ask people, How Can I Help You? And I invite people to contact me with their questions.

The next thing that happens is a beautiful thing. In less than 24 hours, I have enough material to write about for almost an entire month! Granted I have a lot of contacts, but really, you don’t have to know a lot of people in order to get requests for help. For instance, if you have around 100 people following you on Twitter, you can simply write a tweet stating that you have experience with a certain skill, does anyone need help? If you do that, it is very likely that at least one person will reply with a request for help.

The next step is to take the material that you have received and write content based off these requests. The process is the same as you would apply for any article publication. Research your material, research your keywords and proceed to produce a very well written article and publish it on your blog. After you publish the article, send an email back to the person who requested your help and inform that person that you wrote an entire article for them and published it live on your blog. They will be so thrilled that you took so much time to help them.

I hope that you enjoyed reading this article. What are some other ways search engine marketers can do to avoid writers block? Share your feedback and opinions in the comments below.

I often get asked this question and I would like to open up a discussion with you regarding domain name selection in relation to search engine ranking. In my experience, I feel that the domain name you choose can strongly influence the keywords you rank for in Google. I know that this isn’t always the case, because there are plenty of popular blogs that have odd names, that rank for keywords that aren’t found in their domain name. 

The difference I see though is with popularity and backlinks pointing back to these more popular sites. For me, I build very low traffic and low key niche sites. Just about every web site that I build has a domain name with the primary keywords in it that I am targeting. Typically it doesn’t take very long to rank for the keyword phrase I am targeting. Within that, I will also rank for many relevant keyword phrases based off the primary keyword phrase due to me writing content that specifically targets these other phrases. 

All in all, I have had and continue to have great success with doing this. With that said, I’ll admit, I have never tried to target keyword phrases using a domain name that didn’t match up with the primary keyword phrase I target. So I can’t say for sure that what I am doing is truly a legitimate tactic or strategy. That is why I wanted to carry on a discussion with you about it. I’d like to know your opinion on how important do you think domain name selection is for search engine ranking? Share your feedback and opinions using the comment form below. 

On my blog I frequently open up the flood gates and allow for readers to ask me questions and I then provide them with a response. One of the questions asked was absolutely perfect to post here and share with you.

The single most difficult thing with running a blog or web site is scoring traffic and landing backlinks, Especially if your blog or web site is geared towards promoting affiliate products. So how does a blogger or as webmaster increase traffic and score backlinks? Well, let’s start with reading the question that I was asked:

Hi Garry,

I am working on a couple of new sites at the moment that I wouldn’t usually use WordPress for but as you know I have been learning the ins & out’s of WordPress for a few months now so have decided to go ahead and use it for these new sites to see how it pans out.

Once I have the sites completed, I know I can gain organic search results over time and can even provide relevant links from other sites of mine. With that said, can you recommend any other ways of getting links/traffic to an affiliate based site?

With your Micro Niche Sites, do you invest time in link building to these sites or are they a truly “build, walk away and see what happens” type of sites?

I do want to build, walk away and see what happens with a few of these sites but I also want them to at least generate an asdense monthly payment along with some affiliate payments. Any advice is well appreciated.

Thanks, dave.

Wow! When I read this question that Dave had asked me, I was very excited to provide my feedback not only for him, but for all of my blog readers. Secondly, I now look forward to sharing this with you. Here is my response back to Dave.

Hi Dave,

I great way to get organic links is to have a bunch of friends who will bend over backwards for you. If you simply be a super nice guy and help people as much as you can afford to, when it comes time to asking for help in return, such as asking for a few backlinks on some blog posts that you have keywords you are targeting on it, friends will grant these requests.

Secondly, friends will also voluntarily advertise your blog or site on their blog or site if you ask them to. This is very successful because the post comes from the author in which many people follow.

Look at it this way, tomorrow, if I wrote a blog post and told everyone to check out John Doe’s Blog because he is offering something that I feel everyone will enjoy, he will end up getting quite a bit of traffic because I suggested to my readers that he has someone worth their while.

Asking… it never hurts to ask. The worst someone can say is, “No!” Never take offense when someone says NO, it’s a crap shoot… some people will grant your requests, others will not… no big deal.

I ask for TONS of favors from my friends, but also too I work my tail off to make sure that I help them TWO FOLD in return. At any given time, and I am not tooting my horn, I can get well over 100 high quality backlinks to any site I want within just a few hours. You have to be careful of that though. You never want to channel links to a web site or blog too quickly. If you do, Google has filters that catch that and I believe that will get you on their radar. Getting on Google’s radar is something that you don’t want to have happen.

Like I said, there is a balance… you can’t link build too aggressively. Google red flags that…. you got to maintain a nice steady pace and build as naturally and organically as possible.

You asked me if I invest time into link building? YES! On sites that target keywords that are too strong and competitive just to rank organically on their own without backlinks, yeah… I get links. These links though aren’t just, “Hey Bob, can you add me to your blogroll?” These are very well thought out and personalized backlinks that I put a lot of time into scoring.

Growing a site in a competitive niche is very much like being in chemistry class. I don’t spend too much time with competitive keywords, I more go after the ones that just naturally rank on their own in the top ten simply by creating the content, getting the page indexed and filling a VOID in the Google SERP.

After reading Dave’s question and reading my response to his question, what else can you add to this? What are some other creative ways towards scoring backlinks and increasing traffic to your blog or web site that is geared towards promoting affiliate based products?  Share your thoughts by leaving a comment below.

Make no mistake folks, link building is a very important aspect in getting traffic from Google. Many of you guys and gals read my personal blog and I spend quite a bit of time talking about building micro niche blogs and targeting keywords that don’t require backlinks. While that is true, in a way that also limits you from capitalizing on prime keywords. Ranking for prime keywords are definitely in your reach; however, this can not be archived without launching a well thought out and well researched link building campaign.

So how do you launch an effective link building campaign? Well, really for many of you reading this, the problem is finding sites that will willingly add your link to their pages. But if you think about this for a second, you very well may already have a huge source of sites to use at your disposal. How many web sites or blogs do you have? Is there any reason why you’re not using your own web sites or blogs to help build backlinks to another blog or web site of yours?

I do this all the time! Granted, I have friends who’ll add my link to certain blogs posts upon request, but a large percentage of my link building comes from my own internal fleet of blogs. There is nothing wrong with using your existing blogs or web sites to help build up the number of backlinks to another blog or web site that you own.

What about doing this on sites that all share the same IP address? Well, that’s a good question… I am glad I asked myself that. Here are my thoughts about that. If you are in the business of building sites with the aim of trying to get them to rank high in the SERPs then you really need to do things right and be organized with how you distribute your sites among different servers. Granted, I think a lot of the myth about having multiple sites on the same IP might be slightly over-rated.

But guess what? I can’t prove that! I don’t work at Google. I don’t have their magical formula. There is one thing that I do know, and that is the cost of web hosting. When I started building web sites, hosting was expensive! Today, you can order web hosting for as little as $4.95 / month! So, to answer your question about having multiple sites on the same IP address, I’ll say this. I can’t prove that this is good or bad, but seeing how cheap web hosting is today, why risk it? Be organized, and distribute your sites among different servers.

Having that said, let’s talk about how to build backlinks to your web sites and blogs by using your own sites. When you determine which keywords that you want to start using to plug links to a certain site or blog of yours, simply do a Google search for that keyword on your site to see how many instances are there.

Example: site:yourname.com “keyword phrase”

When you do that, Google will return a list of web pages or blog posts on your site or blog that where that keyword is used. If the page or post is older, you can almost guarantee that there will be a little bit of PageRank on that page as well. Go back and edit this page or post and plug your link to point to the blog or site that you are trying to build links to.

If you are like me and use WordPress blogs and want to do this automatically, then there is a very handy plugin that will soon become your best friend. The plugin is called aLinks and unfortunately the web site has been down for several months. The only place I have found where you can download this plugin is HERE. aLinks is a plugin that allows you to automatically link keywords on your blog and point them to any destination that you want. It’s one of my personal favorites.

Anyway, I hope that you found this article to be helpful. What are some other creative ways to build backlinks to your site? Drop a comment below and share your thoughts!