Laura Wimble

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Create Your Robots.txt for Google!

May 8th, 2011 | Author: Laura Wimble

Although for professional search engine optimisation consultants the notion for robots.txt is very familiar, for those who have just began their journey into the world of search engine optimisation it might not be so clear. Basically, a robots.txt will tell search engine spiders coming to crawl your website about the directories and files that you want to be indexed from your website. Therefore, a wrongly used robots.txt might actually have a huge impact on the evolution of your website. You could make it difficult or even impossible for search engine robots to crawl your website simply by a mistake in your robots. Txt.

Why use robots.txt? Here are the reasons why you should use robots.txt: – to signal search engine spiders not to crawl or index certain sections or pages of your site. – to prevent indexing totally. You can exclude certain areas of your site from being indexes. – to issue individual indexing instructions to specific search engines.

Creating your robots.txt Robots.txt is a simple file that you can edit in Notepad and after save in the root directory of your site, where you also have your home page.

Each entry for your robots.txt has to contain two lines: User-Agent: [Spider/ Bot name] Disallow: [Directory/ File Name]

According to your reason for using robots.txt, here is how you can put it together:

1. If you want to exclude a file from an individual Search Engine:

User-Agent: Googlebot Disallow: /private/privatefile.htm

2. If you want to exclude only a section of your site from spiders:

You do not need to specify each robot that you wish to exclude anymore, because you can simply use a wildcard character, ‘*’, which will lead to its immediate exclusion. User-Agent: * Disallow: /newsection/

3. If you want to allow search engine spiders to index everything:

Using the same wildcard, ‘*’, you signal that all spiders are welcome to crawl your entire site. Remember you need to leave the second line, disallow, empty, that is your disallow from nowhere.

User-agent: * Disallow: Once you got your robots.txt in place, you need to make sure they have been done correctly. The tool to use for this is Google Webmaster Tool. As we have talked about in a previous blog (Create your Search Engine Marketing Strategies by Using Google Webmaster Tool), one of the features offered by this tool allows you to check your robots.txt. Basically, Google will automatically and in real time retrievethe robots.txt from your website and adds the main url to the list of urls that should be checked.

As search engine optimisation consultants, we would recommend you pay very much attention to the way you are using this due to their great impact on your search engine marketing strategy. They can help your site in getting higher visibility from search engine spiders, but can also be quite destructive if done wrongly.

If you would like to share your experience in using robots.txt or would like to add to our list other tips that might help in the creation of robots.txt, we would love to read your comments!

SysComm International is a social networking company,online reputation management and search engine marketing company. Click here to contact us. Visit the Uber Article Directory to get a totally unique version of this article for reprint.

Improve Your Pay Per Click Advertising Copies!

April 26th, 2011 | Author: Laura Wimble

Pay per click adverting is being used nowadays by most online businesses. Although PPC search engine internet advertising has quite straightforward guidelines of use, its effectiveness in terms of clicks and conversions is highly dependent on the quality of your ad copy. As a search engine optimisation consultant, SysComm has compiled a list of tips and techniques that can help your ad stand out from the crowd. For both Google pay per click campaigns and other search engines that offer PPC services (Yahoo, MSN), the following tips on improving your ad copies apply:

1. The heading/title is considered the most important part of a PPC copy. Therefore, we would suggest focusing on it and making it attractive!

2. Insert your targeted keywords in the ad title.

3. Include your targeted keywords in the ad title.

4. Whenever possible, include a Special Offer in the ad text. People respond better when seeing any “Free” add-on offers in the ad title. One example could be: free delivery, free bonus software, or free 30-day trial.

5. Use a short URL for the “display URL” section. They offer you free brand exposure for your domain name.

6. The displayed URL would be more appealing if you include capitalization. Chances your URL gets memorized are increased.

7. Use clear, precise sentences, not just keywords.

8. Use Google’s Keyword Insertion Feature. Through it, you can place a code into your ad copy that will auto-populate your ad with whatever search query is used, provided that particular keyword is being targeted in your ad group. The keyword insertion feature has the potential of getting more clicks, because generally people are tempted to click on an ad that exactly matches their search.

9. The language you use is of great importance. Use clear, precise sentences.

10. Use Google’s Keyword Insertion Feature.This feature allows you to place a code into your ad copy that will auto-populate your ad with whatever search query is used, provided that keyword is being targeted in your ad group. The keyword insertion feature has the potential of getting more clicks, because generally people are tempted to click on an ad that exactly matches their search.

Pay per click advertising is a service provided by most search engines and which offers online businesses the opportunity to reach their exact audience and promote their services to those directly interested.

SysComm International provides focused Internet marketing services including fully managed and highly successful Search Engine Marketing Company, Social Media Marketing.

Use LinkedIn Effectively For Yous Business

April 20th, 2011 | Author: Laura Wimble

The number of social networking sites a business can use to promote itself and interact with existing and potential clients is very high at the moment. Just to mention few of the most popular at the moment: Facebook, Twitter, FriendFeed, Bebo etc. However, there is one social network with very unique features, due to its focusing on a particular niche. LinkedIn is an interconnected network of experienced professionals with a huge potential of helping both you as a person and as a company. Some of the benefits one could get from having a complete and well developed profile on LinkedIn are: increase visibility, improve your connectability, enhance your search engine marketing results, increase the relevancy of your job search, ask for advice, as well as research one your competition, customers or partners.

According to the official statistics published on LinkedIn, the network

* Has more than 60 million members

* A new member joins LinkedIn approximately every second

* Executives from all Fortune 500 companies are LinkedIn members

The main steps to consider when integrating LinkedIn as part of your online marketing strategy are:

1. Create your complete profile!

When you will interact with others on LinkedIn, your profile will be the first item users will see. Therefore, it needs to be complete! Make sure you fill in all relevant information about yourself, your area of expertise as well as your experience.

Upload a professional photo of yourself. People tend to give more credibility to profiles with pictures and they engage more as well to those profiles.

Keep in mind that the better you optimize your profile, the more relevant it will be in the searches.

Therefore, follow some basic search engine optimisation techniques:

* Hyperlink using targeted keywords! Include in your profile URLs for your blog and your company, but customize them with your keywords. For example, instead of linking your blog to just ‘My Blog’, you can choose keywords such as ‘SEO blog’.

* Use keywords in descriptions! When writing your summary, specialities or experience, include your keywords, to make your profile more searchable.

* Include the links to your blog and website to your profile.

* Set up a vanity URL for your profile.

2. Build a strong network of contacts!

Once your profile is complete and well optimised, you need to start adding connections. First you can search for friends and work colleagues. However, you can also find those that are considered authorities in your industry and try to get in touch with them. Also, if you are interested in people working in a particular company/industry you can try the advanced search options from LinkedIn.

3. Promote your profile!

There are two ways to promote your profile:

* On LinkedIn

* Through other channels

On LinkedIn, you can do that by joining groups on topics in your industry and start engaging by answering questions and participating in discussions.

Outside the social network by posting your profile on your website, your blog, your business card, your e-mail signature and integrate it in other social networking sites you are using.

4. Stay engaged on LinkedIn!

The more you engage the more feedback you are likely to get. Also, if the LinkedIn community sees you as a valuable contributor, you will gain trust and credibility.

You can engage frequently by:

* Participating in discussions

* Updating your status on a regular basis

* Ask questions yourself

5. Keep your profile updated!

As mentioned above, the process of gaining credibility involves active engagement. Therefore, updating all information of your profile on a regular basis is essential.

6. Use third-party applications to make the most of your profile!

There are a great number of third-party applications on LinkedIn that can help you promote yourself, your website and your blog effectively. You can use Slideshare for sharing with your network your business presentations, Company Buzz to monitor messages sent out on Twitter about your company or subjects of interest to you or Box.net to add links to files like resumes.

You can also synchronise your WordPress blog and it will add a box to your profile which will show your last posts and a summary of them. Since I have mentioned above the importance of updating your status, but since we are all using so any social networks, I would suggest synchronising your Twitter with your LinkedIn profile. This way your profile will be automatically updated from Twitter.

7. Get recommended!

Your profile is not complete as long as you do not have at least a recommendation. You can request for a recommendation from previous employers, current employers or other business contacts that could provide you with a recommendations. Why getting a recommendation is a must? It adds credibility to your profile. Your expertise is this way recognised by a person who has actually collaborated with you.

8. Start a group!

Show your involvement and desire to share information on a certain industry by creating a group. To get it started right, you need to keep in mind the following:

* Choose a relevant name. The name of your blog needs to contain keywords. It needs to be searchable for all those who might be interested in that industry.

* Add a logo. Just as a profile picture is important to gain credibility, a good logo takes your group one step further in its popularity.

* Make sure the size of your logo fits the required size.

* Use the available option to display your group in the Group Directory and on member’s profile.

9. Promote and manage your group!

Creating a group and abandoning it will not bring you any benefits. You need to promote it and manage it. Get members and then keep them engaged. In order to get members, you need to promote your group. Of course, you can start by inviting your connections that might be interested in that industry. But your group should not be limited to your connections.

Therefore you should promote it through:

* Adding the linked logo of the group on your website/blog;

* Sending an email newsletter to your subscribers to announce them of your new group,

* Promoting the group on other social media groups.

Some tips in managing your group effectively are:

* Add discussions and news,

* Post jobs, if relevant,

* Send announcements to the members of the group,

* Import your blog RSS feed.

LinkedIn is a social network for professionals that are looking to promote both themselves and their company. For business purposes, LinkedIn gives you an amazing opportunity to generate new leads.

If you have any comments or questions regarding using LinkedIn for your business, we would love to hear from you! As a social media marketing, online reputation management and search engine marketing company, SysComm offers LinkedIn promotion services. If you would like to find out more about how SysComm can help you build and manage your online presence, please click here.

SysComm International is a social networking company, online reputation management and search engine marketing company. Click here to contact us.

Google Image Search – Its Importance For Your SEO

April 17th, 2011 | Author: Laura Wimble

Images can not only make your website visually attractive, they also help you gain more daily search engine traffic. Google Image Search is the version of Google dedicated to images and it is a very effective technique for your search engine marketing strategy and implicitly for your search engine optimisation strategy. Google Image Search has billions of images available from websites that have been already indexed. According to Hitwise UK, Google Image Search gets more traffic than supposed major search engines in the UK, which gives it a huge potential for your search engine optimisation as a source of traffic for your site.
For a business trying to integrate search engine marketing strategies as to improve their search engine optimisation, the use of Google Image Search is very effective. If done correctly, the optimisation of your images can bring a number of advantages:

* it can drive traffic and bring a great number of visitors to your website,

* it helps define your overall page theme.

However, there are guidelines one needs to follow to get his image on Google Image Search. There is no possibility to use search engine submission as to submit your image to Google, as with websites. That is because results are entirely shown by Google’s algorithm after robots have indexed the complete websites with images. Google’s imaging spider is called Google Image Bot. It crawls the web and indexes all of the pages it can find. Since it cannot ‘see’ images, so it only takes them based on a number of factors:

1. Descriptive Image Name.

2. Compliant Images.

3. On Page Optimization.

4. PageRank and Backlinks.

5. Website Relevancy.

6. Image Storage.

These are the guidelines for Google-sensitive image reference one should follow -

1. Make your image file name keyword rich – include the keywords you want to rank high in the file name and make the folder accessible to robots.

2. Alt tags should have keywords – Alt tags are designed to provide alternative text when images cannot be displayed. They should describe what the image is about.

3. Put your keywords in the image title tag – It is shown when the user hovers over the image.

4. Add target keywords in the text close to the image -Surround your image with related text for robots to give high ranking.

5. Optimize your page for the keywords – Include the keywords in the title tags, meta tags and header tags. It is important that you have a high keyword density on the page that the image is on.

6. Re-upload images – Uploading same pictures in a gap of few months helps in maintaining search freshness for robots.

7. Make your images large – many people search large size images when they use google images. Also a high-resolution image works better than low resolution.
Use Google Image Labeller, it’s a feature of Google Search that allows you to label images and help improve the quality of Google’s image search results.

If you have used Google Image Search in your online marketing strategy or are planning to use it as part of your search engine marketing and search engine optimisation strategy, we would love to hear your thoughts!

SysComm International is a social media marketing, online reputation management and search engine marketing company. Click here to contact us.

How to Best Use Social Media Marketing for Business

April 5th, 2011 | Author: Laura Wimble

Some companies, especially the smaller ones, are wary of social media and cannot figure out the right way to use it. Some business owners are outright scared of using social media, but once these business owners overcome their fear, it’s time to act. Here are the tips for companies beginning their journey in social media.

Get a Foothold: Select one social media network that you are most comfortable with or that is the most relevant to your company or products, and create an account and a public profile. While you may eventually want to create a presence on more than one social media site, you don’t need to feel out of depth right in the beginning.

Learn the Ropes: Observe how others, including your competition, are participating on the social media platform that you have chosen. Write down what seems to work and what does not, and what you like and what you do not. Take special note of how people interact. What’s the tone of the conversations? Is it a one-way conversation?

Make a Plan: What do you want to gain from your social media interactions? Think through your goals – it’s one thing to participate in social media but to do so without a plan can be frustrating and even damaging to your business. Reverse engineer a process that will accomplish what you are aiming to do.

Be a part of the Buzz: An important part of any effective media campaign is keeping track of who is talking about your company, what is being said, and how others are reacting to it. Utilising good social media monitoring tools will not only help you stay on top of this…it may even find you new business opportunities.

Be Social: Even though you are representing a business, don’t ignore the importance of the “social” aspect. And don’t think you need to be all business, all the time. Allow your interactions to retain the human side that will facilitate genuine connections. Giving a personal feel to your presence will make your business more approachable and relatable.

Respond to Society: There is nothing worse than a business attempting to be active across social media, but ignoring the general public. Once you commit to a social media marketing campaign, you should also commit to responding to questions, complaints and other input from your existing and potential customers.

Get Feedback: Ask for feedback, reviews and insight to help you reach your target more effectively. One powerful use for social media in business is as a customer service tool. Instead of waiting for a customer to air a complaint, use social media as a way to engage and interact with your audience. And be sure to thank everyone who chimes in individually.

Consistency is Key: Your profiles, comments, posts and conversations should stay true to your company’s overall mission and values. If more than one person is posting on behalf of your company, it’s vital to have a standard tone and guidelines for consistency. Once you expand your reach to more than one social media site, consistency is even more important.

Hire an Agency: Agencies can bring added scale and expertise. Social media is a commitment, and it requires manpower to interact with thousands of fans, tweets, comments, and more. Rather than leaving it completely to the interns, agencies can help provide added scale from people with expertise in the space. A good social media strategy firm would really know what they’re doing. Their accumulated resources, accounts, profiles and contacts will take campaigns to the top, to properly build company-related social media assets, and to get the buzz heading in the right direction.

Social media sites change their procedures regularly. What works today to get a front-page story on Digg or massive “retweets” on Twitter may not work tomorrow. A company who is deeply embedded, who breathes social media every day, can be a tremendous benefit. It’s normally less expensive to hire a firm to do social media marketing compared to hiring an individual or team to work exclusively for a company.

SysComm is a social media marketing , online reputation management and search engine marketing company. Click here to contact us.

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Author Archive

Create Your Robots.txt for Google!

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Improve Your Pay Per Click Advertising Copies!

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Use LinkedIn Effectively For Yous Business

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Google Image Search – Its Importance For Your SEO

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How to Best Use Social Media Marketing for Business

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