SEO

1. 69

   lucieanneposted 13 years ago

   I've just borrowed a book from the library called 'search Engine Optimisation'. Is reading it going to be beneficial to me if I haven't got my own website?

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   1. 0

      shazwellynposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      The trouble is when something has been published, it can be already out of date. 
      
      Psychologically speaking, the best way to learn anything is through experiential learning.  Get your hands in there and make mistakes - boy you learn quick! hehehe
      
      Start reading hubs from Sunforged, Edweirdo (go back to his first 'diary type' hub - very useful!) and remember to create great reading hubs - you are already on a great high ranking platform (Hubpages) - use it, you have everything you need here for SEO!
      
      I hope this helps

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      1. 69

         Peter Hogganposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Yep there is no substitute for experience.

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   2. 85

      Marisa Wrightposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Back to the OP - there's so much information on SEO on the internet, don't you waste your time on a book that's two years old.  That's ancient in internet terms!

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      1. 69

         lucieanneposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Thanks for all the replies above. I'm out of my depth with SEO anyway. I'll just keep publishing hubs for now and see where it goes. I'm not nearly experienced enough to go digging about for stuff I don't understand. I don't even understand half of the replies (lol)

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         1. 91

            Pcunixposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            I wouldn't worry too much.  Most of it is esoteric and of limited effectiveness. Your best action is just to keep writing the best content you can.
            
            If you DO want to learn a bit, I'd start with Google themselves and i would also suggest Peter Hoggans excellent series which starts at http://hubpages.com/hub/A-Free-SEO-Trai … or-Hubbers

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   3. 52

      thomasluissposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Of course!! you will get to learn how to do marketing of your site on internet. It is definitely gonna be beneficial to you.
      http://www.articlesbase.com/art-and-ent … 97662.html

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2. 72

   sunforgedposted 13 years ago

   what year was it published?
   
   its a rapidly changing field

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   1. 69

      lucieanneposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      It's the second edition 2008

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3. 0

   ryankettposted 13 years ago

   Somebody recently recommended this to me:
   
   http://www.amazon.com/SEO-2010-Search-O … amp;sr=8-1
   
   That book even covers Bing, I haven't read it though.... I'm a freestyler...

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4. 68

   thisisoliposted 13 years ago

   Reading a book on SEO cannot hurt, however I have read a couple which actually give you incorrect information.
   
   If for instance the book tells you the importance of keyword meta tags to rank well in Google, you might as well burn it.

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   1. 73

      thranaxposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Hey, those meta tags help with off search engines like Ask and Dogpile. Those old crawlers love the stuff.
      
      ~thranax~

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      1. 69

         Peter Hogganposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Ah Dogpile, haven’t used that in years. But just for correctness it isn’t a search engine it’s a meta engine, i.e. it doesn’t crawl the web or search its own index, rather, it serves up results from search engines that do. Sorry, I know, a bit pedantic.

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         1. 0

            shazwellynposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            Wasnt Dogpile a search engine of pre Google days?  I used to use it before Google was born...  Oh to be young again .. hehehe

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            1. 69

               Peter Hogganposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               Its always been a meta engine as far as I am aware.

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               1. 0

                  shazwellynposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                  I used to use dogpile for all my search needs... until Google came along.
                  
                  Looks like they are all dogged out! *woof*

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               2. 81

                  earnestshubposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                  and a very very good one.

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         2. 84

            Pamela Kinnaird Wposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            Pedantic.  I love learning new words. I've gotta look it up! Thanks.

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   2. 69

      Peter Hogganposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      There are reasons to use to include meta keywords other than SEO, Accessibility for example. I have been wondering recently, especially in light of Google’s search for quality signals, if paying more attention to accessibility and therefore including a keywords tag might deliver some indirect benefit.

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      1. 68

         thisisoliposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         I have to admit I made that post when I was in a rather tangible bad mood. Meta keywords do have their benefits.
         
         What do you mean in relation to meta-keywords and accessibility though?
         
         I know tags on websites can vastly increase a websites presence in search engines, increase accessibility, and provide benefits on leading readers in to areas where they are more likely to buy/click.
         
         But Meta Keywords now seem a little bit lost!

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5. 70

   Bill Manningposted 13 years ago

   The best way to read up to date SEO subjects is to read SEO forums. I know you may feel strange in a forum like that, but you can just lurk and read all the post.
   
   That way you have current SEO tricks. Of course everyone disagrees with a lot of stuff. So once you learn the basics you need to decide for yourself what is important.
   
   Titles, bold text, first sentences of a article, how often to repeat a key word, naming images are some things that you can do without a website.
   
   So it's always good to learn SEO if your doing anything on the web, yes.

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6. 69

   Peter Hogganposted 13 years ago

   Webaster radio, is one of the best resources for up to date seo knowledge. A must for anyone wanting to learn or keep abreast of current SEO developments.
   
   http://www2.webmasterradio.fm/

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   1. 68

      thisisoliposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I will have to check this out!

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7. 0

   askpowersposted 13 years ago

   I am an SEO expert and enjoying this field so much.
   Well its really a fun

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   1. 0

      Website Examinerposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I wonder how many SEO experts there are on HubPages?

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8. 63

   Greek Oneposted 13 years ago

   As I've got almost 3 page views today, I'm thinking of writing an eBook on the subject as well.
   
   Does anyone want to place an advanced order?  I will give you a deal in you order 300 or more

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   1. 0

      Website Examinerposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Working title: "How to Endure while Obscure."
      
      I'll pre-order one copy.

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      1. 63

         Greek Oneposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         yeah.. good idea...
         
         you could wait till i publish, but odds are if you do a google search, you won't find it anywhere

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9. 72

   sunforgedposted 13 years ago

   accessibility also relates to screen readers and other tools used by the disabled/handicapped for web browsing.
   
   If your site can be fully read by one of those - then you have really done a good job w/ the details
   
   http://labs.google.com/accessible/
   
   not sure if meta-keywords have any use in that regards though
   
   designing and coding for the broadest user base is def plus that can only help - many seo standards are compatible with such an ideal

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10. 69

    Peter Hogganposted 13 years ago

    I don’t use yahoo that much but it seems that this search engine still uses the keywords tag. If you search yahoo for xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk the first page returned is the home page of Search Engine Land.
    
    In an experiment to determine which search engines still used keyword tags Search Engine Land added it to their keywords tag, Yahoo seems to be the only search engine to pay any notice. However if you search for the term on ASK you will find that the tagged page does not rank rather a Search Engine Land page about the test containing the term on the page does.
    
    So that is interesting in that it goes against conventional wisdom and we would expect the results to be reversed. I suspect the takeaway is that yahoo traffic can see an improvement if the keywords tag is used. So let’s forget about conventional wisdom for a while.
    
    Google no longer factor PageRank that much in their algo and PR primarily concerned with off page factors, yet there is much talk coming from Google about quality signals which take into account on page stuff. The most talked about seems to be page download time. (I appreciate download time can be affected by off page stuff like hosting on a shared account that has thousands of sites running from the same server or IP)
    
    Download time is only one quality signal, and as sunforged pointed out Google offer accessible search. Rakings here can be altered significantly where preference is given to pages that are accessible. I don’t know how much, if any, of this makes its way through to the main serps but IMO it can only help to make pages as accessible to the widest range of viewers and devices as possible.
    
    As well as download time including a privacy policy, terms and conditions, phone number and postal address all seem to be signals that Google are looking for. I have written a short piece about this http://hubpages.com/hub/On-Page-SEO-Par … of-Quality and will be following up with a more detailed article in the upcoming weeks.
    
    Sunforged, the keywords tag would only be a very small factor in this, if a document is to meet accessibility guidelines it needs to contain a keywords tag, search engines aside it’s still an important part of a html document. Along with other factors like valid error free code, setting font sizes in em's rather than pixels, correct doctype as well as user signals like time on page it might all add to a quality score.

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    1. 68

       thisisoliposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       Yahoo have announced on occasion that they have reduced the importance of meta keywords, This would still be possible as xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk is more than likely a 0 competition area, so any minor SEO technique for the keyword xcvteuflsowkldlslkslklsk would boost it to the top of the rankings.
       
       I think what I am indicating at (In a still groggy state of hangover) is that the test proves that keywords are a factor in Yahoo, but does not discern the weight of the factor.
       
       I would however be very interested in knowing how much of an affect Keywords still have on Yahoo search engine results. Even though Yahoo still remains a very small percentage of my organic traffic, it is still a percentage, and should not be ignored.

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11. 69

    Peter Hogganposted 13 years ago

    Not exactly zero competition oli, there are about 80 pages returned on Yahoo. Not great comprtition either but it does indicate there is some weight given to the keyword tag. I agree though, some further experimentation is required to gain a better idea of how it's weighted.

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    1. 69

       lucieanneposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       So is that a 'yes' then?

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12. 0

    askpowersposted 13 years ago

    One of the most difficult thing is understanding search engine algorithm. Google has never revealed their technology of page rank and still its try and test procedure.
    Well, yahoo and some others are much easier to take down.

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    1. 69

       Peter Hogganposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       The PageRank algo has been in the public domain for years.

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       1. 91

          Pcunixposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          Not quite.
          
          It's patented (and the patent is actually owned by Stanford Unjversity, not Google), and while the math of it is known, Google doesn't disclose the weight it assigns to the variables nor how the derived rank fits in to its other decisions about the value of a page.  So the OP was effectively correct, I'd say.

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          1. 69

             Peter Hogganposted 13 years agoin reply to this

             The OP was about whether or not to by a book on SEO, nothing to do with PageRank.
             
             My comment was based on this statement: "Google has never revealed their technology of page rank and still its try and test procedure." NOT THE OP
             
             As for the roll PageRank plays in the overall ranking of pages, nobody knows for sure. One thing is know however, it’s of very little importance these days.
             
             Hope that makes more sense.

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13. 69

    Peter Hogganposted 13 years ago

    It's a yes in as far as Yahoo use the keywords tag for ranking purposes.

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14. 69

    Peter Hogganposted 13 years ago

    Cheers Pcunix, much appreciated.

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    1. 91

       Pcunixposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       You have a good series.  I just wrote my hub for today expanding on the answer I gave above and I linked to you again.   People who are interested in learning about SEO can get a good start right there with you.

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