Proper Anchor Text Distribution For Better Rankings

A while back after Google released their Penguin update we did awebinar about keywords, linking and ranking after the update.  Today we are going to revisit that data after allowing plenty of time to gather more information and come to some conclusions about the best distribution of anchor text for ranking in Google.

We all know by now that Google does not want people gaming their algorithm.  Despite this their search results are still a computer generated algorithm – there is not a person sitting there for all search phrases deciding which sites rank and which sites don’t.  Due to this basic fact there will always be ways to improve your rankings by aligning your site with what Google is looking for.

Despite what has been said, link building for better rankings is not dead.  Links are still the primary way Google decides what sites to rank where.  The difference is that today those links need to be distributed in a natural manner rather than a keyword based manner.  SEOMOZ ran an article where they looked at 10 national brand sites that rank very well in the search engines and broke down the percentages of links by anchor text.  What they came up with is a good formula for your own link building.

What was found is that about 65% of the links were exact match, phrase matching or brand matching with regards to the anchor text.  The breakdown between these three categories was 18% exact, 17% phrase and 30% brand.  The other links coming in were evenly divided between the URL as the anchor text and unrelated anchor text.

This is a great way to create your own link building strategy.  Using the ratios above, here is what a sample link building strategy might look like for your site, called “Widget World” selling Red Widgets:

For every 100 links built, you should build the following:

18 links with anchor text of “Red Widgets” – this is the exact match

17 links with anchor text containing Red Widgets, such as “Handy Red Widgets”, Waterproof Red Widgets”, etc – this is the phrase match

30 links with anchor text of “Widget World” or slight variation – this is the brand

18 links with the anchor text of “yoursitename.com” – this is the URL

17 links with random anchor text – this could be long tail phrases like “see more about Red Widgets at our site” or simple phrases like “click here” etc.

This is a simplistic breakdown, but the data backs up these general ratios as being the target.  Regardless of whether your links are built all naturally or built by you or outsourced, if you keep to this ratio you will not run afoul of Google, and you will see your rankings increase.

When building these links, you may consider obtaining higher page rank or PR links for the first line item – the exact match phrase.  This will help pump a little more juice through that phrase.  When you combine that with the varied anchor text, adhering to these ratios, you have a winning formula for better rankings.

Finding the higher PR links is not always easy, but a good solution is to work with a private link brokering type of company.  These companies work with individual website owners and contract with them to place your links.  This can be helpful, as it gives you access to low cost,high quality links that are not publicly distributed. 

How to make sure your content gets links

A lot of the SEO industry has embraced content marketing heavily over the last twelve months.

I'd like to say there is no connection with the Penguin update reducing the effectiveness of some low quality ways of getting links, but I think it did have a lot to do with it!

The funny thing is that content marketing has been around for a very, very long time. There are many people out there who are far better at it than many of the SEOs who are now embracing it, so we're playing catchup and trying to find the best route towards using content to get good results for our clients.

This is quite tough and we're going to make mistakes along the way, some content will fly, some won't. The goal for many SEOs is links and social shares and if a piece of content isn't quite right, it may not get either of these.

We need to try and reduce the risk of content not being well received by putting some hard work into the process for content creation. Therefore trying to anticipate potential problems as early as possible. This is what I'll discuss shortly and give some hands-on tips for.

Before we get into that though, I want to briefly discuss how SEOs think of content.

Content as an business asset

When you start thinking of a piece of content as an asset to your business, it puts a whole new perspective on things and importantly, the work you put into creating it. It is no longer a throw away piece of content that is there "just for links".

Instead, you're trying to create something that your client will be proud of and their competitors will be envious of.

You want to aim to create a piece of content where a competitor looks at it and says "Wow, I wish we'd thought of that."

Thinking of content as a proper asset can help towards this and make it mean more. 

There are other benefits too:

• The asset isn't just for links, it can be useful for PR and social activity too which makes it a lot easier to get sign-off for.
• It is less likely to be a one-off piece of link building activity and more likely to be something that has the ability to get links for a long time.
• You're more likely to build content that is relevant to your client's customers which means that the benefit goes far beyond the links you get.

Hopefully you can see the benefits too. But what about the process for doing this?

Process for content creation

The words processes and systems can strike fear into the heart of some people because of negative experiences with them. If you're one of those people, I'd encourage you to take a look at this post on processes.

Hat tip to Will for showing me this. Not all processes are bad and when they're used in the right context, they can help protect against failure.

I want to share a simple set of questions and techniques that should help you produce content that attracts links and social shares.

Who will care about this content?

This is a tough question to ask, but answering it honestly can help ensure that you don't spend valuable time and resources on a piece of content that no one cares about.

Ask yourself who would read the content, who would relate to it and go and find them online to make sure there is an active community of interested people.

It is important to find an active community, otherwise you're probably not going to have many people who have the ability to link and hardly anyone to outreach to. This pretty much ruins your chances of getting links and social shares before you've even started.

Make sure that you expand this question beyond your team at the very least because sometimes, your team (and you) can be a little too emotionally invested in a piece of content which means that you're not the best person to judge how good it could be.

We're also very protective of our own ideas and want to see them through. So it is worth putting emotion and ego to one side in order to make sure that it isn't just you that loves the idea!

Why will someone care about this content?

Another tough question, but this is equally important and as we'll see, can help massively with your outreach if you decide to proceed with the idea.

There are any number of reasons that someone may care about a piece of content, here are a few:

• It's funny.
• It's informative.
• It's useful.
• It challenges the status quo.
• It answers a question.

Ultimately, a piece of content needs to trigger some kind of emotional response in order to make people care about it. Otherwise, the content will be opened and forgotten about very quickly, losing all chance of getting links and social shares.

This is another check that can make sure that a piece of content stands a good chance of getting links because it can be hard enough to get people to read content, let alone link to it. So if we can make them care about it, we stand much more chance of getting them to take the time to link to it.

Linking to something take a bit of time and effort so we need to make sure we're making each reader care enough to take the time to link.

In terms of helping with outreach, this step can help us too. When we craft an outreach email, we try to connect with the person we're contacting and make them care about what we're showing them. If we already know why someone would care, then we can work this into our outreach email and be confident that we will get some good responses.

Who will link to or share this content?

This is a super quick one that you can do when you first get an idea for a piece of content. When you first get an idea that you feel is quite solid, go and find ten people that you think would link to it - in ten minutes. If you can't find ten people in ten minutes, is it really such a good idea? 

It also doesn't bode well for finding lots of other link prospects if you can't find just ten. It sounds like a harsh test, but it can really help weed out a good idea from a truly great idea.

Would the CEO be proud of this content?

This questions helps to keep yourself in check on a couple of fronts:

• It keeps the content on brand and in line with beliefs of the company.
• It ensures you're creating content that is relevant to the business.
• It makes you think about creating content that will attract real customers as well as links.
• If you ever have to present to the CEO on what you've been doing, you can be confident that they won't shoot down your campaigns.

This check is very much needed because we can sometimes focus a bit too heavily on getting links, without thinking about why we're doing it. If we ask ourselves this question, it is no longer 100% about links, it is about creating a great piece of content that is an asset to the business.

Outreach to a handful of external bloggers to get their feedback

If possible, this is a great one that I've used several times.

As mentioned above, we can often be a bit too close to an idea which means we're not able to objectively judge how good it really is. To truly test whether an idea is worthy of attracting links, why not ask the people who you want to link to it? Why not do it before you've even created the content?

It makes perfect sense to speak to bloggers before you finish a piece of content. You can even speak to them before you've even started on a piece of content. Not only are you getting a good sense check against your ideas from knowledgable people, but you're giving them a heads up on something they may want to link to.

So when the content does go live, it is far easier to ask for a link from these bloggers because they have already been involved in the process. They may have even given you a suggestion that you have now incorporated.

You can then go back to them and say how you've taken on board their feedback and created something really cool., this is a great way of building relationships with bloggers. Follow this link for details - http://econsultancy.com/in/blog/61938-how-to-make-sure-your-content-gets-links

Google Tests Bigger URLs, Cache Link Drop Down & Product Quantities In Search Results

This weekend, Google was caught testing at least three different user interface designs within the search results. They tried bigger URLs listed under the search snippet, they tested a new navigation path to the cache and similar links within each search result and they are testing showing the number or quantity of products display on a particular page within the search results.

Let me show you each test.

(1) Bigger URLs under the search snippet was discovered by @jsilton:

If this is legit, hard to say. It might be something wrong with the browser settings or it may be a real Google test.

(2) Cache & Similar links moved as a drop down option within the search results was discovered by VITEB on Google+:

Interesting that they would call out that feature so much with an arrow down option. Don't you think?

(3) Google showing the number of products listed on a page as a rich snippet like snippet add on was discovered by Matt Storm on Google+:

I am not sure if this is a PLA feature or if it is rich snippet related, I cannot reproduce it.

As you can see, Google is constantly testing new user interfaces within the search results.

Forum discussion at Twitter, Google+ and Google+ respectively.

Article source: http://www.seroundtable.com/google-serp-design-test-16307.html

CSV Or Written text Computer file Structure Needed For Disavow Weblink Tool

To many of us, posting a Disavow link file to Search engines for their concern should be done in CSV or text format. Most of us wouldn't consider using an succeed file or Term papers. But that is not always the situation.

A Search engines Website proprietor Help line has a website proprietor who posted a Ms Term papers in the file format .DOCX via the disavow device publish type. Then they reported that nothing occurred in the community. Google David Mueller described that the file format he used was not reinforced. David wrote:

After examining the scenario with your website, this indicates that the artificial hyperlinks to your website were not really disavowed.. Looking into information, the file you posted to the disavow device seems to be a "DOCX" file, and not a regular text or CSV file. Because of that, we don't have much that we can procedure there. To our techniques, these collections look mostly like gobbledygook, so while we try to use them for the device, they don't map to the URLs that you probably desired to send.

I'd suggest posting it again, in the appropriate format, so that it can be prepared and used for the reconsideration ask for. As I don't know for sure that your file would contain all of the appropriate artificial hyperlinks, a appropriate distribution would definitely help. A excellent way to double-check that we're able to choose up the material is to use the "download" link after posting, and to perspective it in Search engines Documents instead of installing it as a CSV file.

Watch Google He Cutts Get Shot Up

The movie above of Google He Cutts is unusual in that he often doesn't display this much feelings and sensation in his video clips.

He ranted about how so many individuals drop for "snake oil fraud SEO" and then drop for it again and again.

Here are some quotations from it clip, but this is a fun watch:
You're a website owner and you don't understand that these individuals have 10 sock puppets?

You go with the guy who has removed 10 sites, but he guarantees now is different?

That guy doesn't know how Search engines captured his sector [that was penalized], he has no concept the different methods or resources we are using.

At the end, He creates the connect to just go white-colored hat now instead of enjoying the experience.

Forum conversation at Google+ and Search engines Webmaster Help.

Look for engines Says There Was No Upgrade, We're Dreaming

Sometimes individuals desire up factors they really want to be actual - but is there ever some time where public of individuals have the same desire and they are informed that desire was not real? Okay, I am forcing it here...

On Saturday, we revealed fairly important and effective symptoms and symptoms of there being a Look for engines update on Dec Thirteenth. I e-mailed Look for engines to get verification for a publish on Look for Motor Area and Look for engines originally informed me it was not a Panda update and then lastly verified with me that there was no update at all.

No update! So the website owners and SEOs in the boards realizing large position and visitors changes were incorrect. That can be, it is a little choosing.

But what about the three significant computerized Look for engines update sites such as MozCast, SERPmetrics and SERPS.com? They all revealed large symptoms and symptoms of a Look for engines update and they monitor factors fairly logically.

Maybe there was a bug? Maybe something else is going on.

But Look for engines went on history with me - there was no Panda update, there was no other update as far as they are conscious of.

Believe it or not - there was no update.
Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld & Google+.

Google+ Detailed Twice On One Look for engines Regional Listing

Typically if you search Look for engines for local outcomes, you may see a weblink to the company Google+ web page. But do you ever see two different hyperlinks to Google+ webpages under one listing? Generally not.

But in one situation, you do. Look for for [suit modifications london, uk parker street] and the outcome for a web page has two Google+ hyperlinks under the local outcomes.

What is exciting is that the Google+ web page is the same, the only distinction is that one hyperlinks to the content and the other hyperlinks to the about area, but the Google+ organization web page is the same.

Google's Jade massage beds Wang said she will look into it, she wrote:

Interesting... looking into it. Thanks for confirming.
If it was me, I'd probably remain silent and take the additional weblink.

It Works! The Search engines Disavow Device Eliminated A Penalty

In mid-October, Search engines released the disavow weblink oral appliance some have reported it doesn't perform but it seems like it does indeed perform. As an FYI, it seems 50/50 have used the tool (poll over here).

Dixon Jackson from Grand SEO, a individual I regard, believe in and know is very sincere, published in a Google+ line that he used it for a website and it assisted it get out of a guide weblink charge. Dixon wrote:
I have got a guide charge raised... which had a excellent impact from a really bad position. There is no query that the website in query has not came back to past stages from before the charge... but then again it had a guide charge for a reason!

When requested for more information, Dixon explained:
I proved helpful difficult to eliminate the bad hyperlinks - but was incapable to shift them all. So I recorded the initiatives in the disavow information file and then provided here we are at the disavow information file to take impact in the catalog. +Uri Lederman I was straight informed in the re-inclusion e-mail that I had a guide charge which was now raised. +Cody Cahill Now - many of the bad hyperlinks still are available - but are now presumably disavowed - so causation v connection seems powerful. Plus - still nothing tangible - but look at who did a +1 on my preliminary viewpoint ;)

Now, this should perform for a guide charge easily. Those who want it to perform for a Penguin weblink charge need to hang on for a new Penguin renew. There is a Webmaster World line just on the Penguin/Disavow subject itself.
But from this we can have a very excellent and sincere viewpoint that the tool does indeed perform and should perform with Penguin if used properly and when there is a information renew or upgrade.