The trend in long-tail keyword use in marketing strategy is largely the result of cost efficiency in advertising. Used as a cost conversion mechanism in search engine optimization (SEO) and pay-per-click (PPC) online advertising campaign, long-tail keywords reduce cost-per-click while increasing the number of click-through observations. By increasing the rate and quality of SEO and PPC response, long-tail keywords have been the subject of Web search engine providers like Google, as those companies attempt to improve long query proficiency.

The Power of Long-Tail Keyword Advertising

The concept of virtual crowd marketing establishes consumer equity at point of search engine keyword classification. Long-tail keywords from natural language searches online offer key insights into advertising conversion. When visitors observe SEO or PPC advertising spots, the decision to ‘click-through’ to a company website is a discerned one. If conversion of visitors to customers offers the rationale to strategic advertising placement, keyword precision is critical.

Long-tail keywords create a record of natural language searches leading to advertising engagement. Popular for building crowds of customers, long-tail keywords go viral more than any other keyword language taxonomy. Peer-to-peer sharing of a brand, its advertising, and website marketing collateral is more likely in response to long-tail keyword searches. Named after statistical long-tail distributions, the probability that long-tail keyword searches will increase the magnitude of advertising ‘click-through’ frequency is high.

Gaining popularity in the past several years, long-tail keyword advertising is especially agile in its ability to sell a volume of unique items, all under the same name brand. For instance, long-tail keyword advertising strategy is use by online retailer aggregators such as Amazon.com, and Yahoo.com to sell a range of warehoused, and third party goods.

Compatible with operations strategies designed to reduce distribution and inventory costs, long-tail keyword searches capture the most precise advertised item per search engine query. Companies can use reporting on long-tail keyword searches to control inventory and cut logistics costs according to the power law distribution or Pareto distribution theories.

Perfect for application in channel marketing strategies online, long-tail keyword placement allows for flexibility after an advertising campaign goes live. An apt method of creating modular campaign design in businesses where advertising is limited to a niche segment or where product lifecycle is abbreviated, long-tail keyword strategies allow advertisers to leverage user-driven innovation, social network analytics, and multi-scale marketing components in development of an online advertising campaign.

Long-Tail Keyword Strategies

The integration of long-tail keyword strategies in PPC advertising campaigns increases competitive advantage in niche markets. Designating channel advertising placement in niche segments of a market allows a business to target customers precisely where competitors are not. Equally, ratio of quality to cost can may influence the decision to incorporate long-tail keywords in a campaign.

The most efficient and effective keyword strategy for SEO and PPC advertising, long-tail keywords are the highest caliber search results, as the inquirer has added precision to the query. Long-tail keyword strategies are higher return on investment in marketing. With visitor volume expected to be low, on demand ‘click’ through payments structured by SEO and PPC advertising hosts add value to conversion.

Online marketing studies show that long-tail keywords are responsible for upwards of 80% of visitor conversion in a SEO or PPC advertising campaign. The fact that cost-per-lead is far less than average makes long-tail keyword marketing well-suited to market entry in competitive segments.

The ‘5’ Most Effective Long-tail Keyword Strategies

Expand market reach and advance conversion by following the five ‘5’ steps to long-tail keyword advertising strategy:

• 1. Query Reports

Prior to initiating a long-tail keyword strategy, the best method of building a taxonomy is by running an AdWords query report. Running a query on a recent AdWords campaign reports terms not already listed as part of a campaign. Using an existing Google AdWords account is the most expedient and reliable method of building a long-tail keyword list. Reflecting recent user observations, the Search Query Report offers important insights into aggregate response and keyword performance. Query results inform bidding as well. Comparison of competition levels for each keyword enables calibration of an ad campaign according to the highest performing keywords at a lower cost per conversion.

Competitor keyword reporting is critical for design-in of unique advertising content. The use of competitor keyword performance in a long-tail keyword strategy will assist in filling gaps in not covered by another similar advertiser. The benefit of tools like KeywordSpy, AdGooRoo and SpyFU, is that online advertising placement can be channeled to exceed competitor reach, or to generate traffic in segments where they are not. This also reduces cost of bidding. By identifying long-tail opportunities, advertisers can increase conversion and outperform competitors.

• 2. Keyword Localization

The localization of keywords increases foreign language syntax proficiency, as well as assists in the acknowledgement of demographic values. Appending keywords with location terms (i.e. country, state, region, city, town, zip or area code) AdWords Analytics reporting will provide metric reporting on ‘click-through’ traffic resulting from keywords searches. Include qualifying terms to add definition to localization information to maximize the reach of advertised product and service segmentation. Qualifiers used in long-tail natural language searches add new keywords to those results. Supplement keywords with add-ons and commonly used descriptive terms (i.e. color, style, model, type) to structure search syntax more narrowly.

• 3. Website Search Engine Record

Reported data from a website’s search box can add further information about what visitors are searching for. Google’s Custom Site Search box is a popular tool used in long-tail keyword queries. Investigation of a website’s search box often reveals unique information not accessible on a third party site. Review searches for terminology related to products, phrases, and map directions. Reporting of exact data from a website search box adds knowledge to a long-tail keyword strategy.

• 4. Search Engine Referral Traffic

Secondary referral traffic to your website offers another compendium of long-term keyword data. Indices of organic search referral traffic identify which keywords were searched immediately prior to y arrival at a website. Although some of this traffic will be categorized as “Unknown Keywords – SSL”, the benefit to secondary search engine data is that it serves as a simple random sample of a global population of potential consumers.

Much like a snowball sample designed to capture objective response from a large general population of unknown users, search engine referral traffic data offers a natural solution to this concept, generating data about long-tail keyword searches. Tools like HubSpot’s Sources Tool and SEOMoz report on secondary search engine referral traffic, including long-tail keyword search phrases. Analysis of volume of searches redirected to your site increases the chance that the long-tail keywords selected for an online advertising campaign will optimize marketing return on investment.

• 5. Cloud Content

Third party virtualization services can also be used to gather information about search engine content from a website. Cloud aggregation of website traffic data is continuous. Advertisers can source details about website performance at anytime from storage. Cloud-based visualization capabilities optimize long-tail keyword search data in graphical illustration. Reporting of visitor frequencies, as well as trend analyses of long-tail keyword searches from website traffic data found on a cloud, can be used by marketing specialists in creation of an online advertising campaign.

Bounce Exchange and OuiBounce both provide your website with an option to accept user enrollment to receive newsletters. A newsletter still provides one of the most effective ways to contact your customers and connect with them at a time when it’s most convenient to them. While social media sites have greatly improved the level of communication between you and your subscribers, certain disadvantages do still exist. A newsletter goes directly to the subscribers inbox, and people tend to review items sent by email more carefully than a status update posted on a business page.

Bounce Exchange Overview

Bounce Exchange works by detecting when a customer leaves your page and providing them with an offer to sign up or receive a free offer instead. This can help you sell more products, keep the customer on your page longer and turn a visitor that would otherwise abandon your page into a returning customer. While the product works and can increase the amount of traffic to your site over the long term, the cost of the service is simply astronomical and not affordable for many small business owners. In contrast, OuiBounce provides an open source alternative that allows you to interact with and connect with your customers without the high price tag.

OuiBounce Overview

The open source OuiBounce software provides everything you need to keep visitors on your site and coming back for more. The software was designed with ease of use in mind and provides a simple, and easy to customize platform for your website. Since the software is Open Source, you don’t have to pay to use it and like Bounce Exchange it exhibits intelligent behavior that allows your website to detect when a user is about to leave your site. The library can help you improve conversion rates by seven to 15 percent, depending on the type of website you operate. You can use OuiBounce to provide real value to your customers and give them something free just for signing up and returning to your website.

Helping Users Find Information

New visitors to your website can’t always locate the information your visitor needs and often, the first reaction is to click the back button when this happens. Before the visitor leaves, you can greet them with a pop-up that allows them to sign up for one of your special offers or provide them with a book he can download to peruse while not on your website. People appreciate when you offer free materials and can visit your website and download materials to peruse in their spare time. By providing them with a PDF booklet, or getting them to sign up for a special offer or newsletter you increase the likelihood that he will return in the future.

Types of Offers

When setting up your first campaign, your options are virtually limitless. As with Bounce Exchange, OuiBounce makes it possible to offer a free eBook, invite the visitor to come back and participate in a webinar, give a link to contact a customer service representative or even give the user a sample course to take in their free time.

OuiBounce is Open Source

Useful and relevant content directed at your customers is the goal of OuiBounce and with a community of Open Source developers, you can remain certain that the software will continue to develop and grow. Additionally, since the software is Open Source, you can edit and change the code however you like. Bounce Exchange is proprietary software that can’t be modified, distributed, or sold. Even if you don’t want to use the software on your website, you can modify it to include additional features and offer it to your site visitors as a free or paid download. Bounce Exchange is very similar to OuiBounce and functions as the commercial version of the product. Provided you don’t need extensive individual help setting up and configuring the software, you can use OuiBounce free of charge without the need to pay the hefty annual fees that Bounce Exchange charges.

OuiBounce Usage and Options

In coordination with other site monitoring tools, you can also set OuiBounce to alert visitors to your website after a set amount of time. Use Google Analytics or another site analytics tool to determine the average time spent per page and prompt users with a dialog box before she leaves. You can set the sensitivity of the software, turn on aggressive mode or create a callback to keep your customer engaged and active on your website. Rather than using the pay per user or campaign scheme of Bounce Exchange, you can use the software for free and provide a value added feature to your website.

Sensitivity

The OuiBounce software library provides a few simple options that you need to understand to get the most out of the library. Sensitivity refers to how far away from the edge of the browser the mouse must be before a prompt displays. If you put the sensitivity too high, you will lose visitors because the pop-up ad may display too quickly before they get a chance to view the website. Set it too low and they might leave the website before they have a chance to view your offer. Bounce Exchange provides a similar feature that intelligently determines when someone is about to leave your website. However, the added cost and system resources used by the software make Bounce Exchange a costly alternative in both time and money.

Aggressive Mode

You can configure OuiBounce to use Aggressive Mode to prevent ads from getting in your visitors way. Aggressive mode shows your advertisement only once per customer. This prevents your visitor from having to dismiss the dialog box each time they move the mouse to a certain position in the screen or visit a new page. Once you set up Aggressive Mode, you can feel confident that the user experience remains high by preventing a negative experience with your website. Users that have to constantly battle advertisements and free offers are less likely to return to your website in the future. Unlike Bounce Exchange, you can set this option with a simple code edit.

Minimum Timers

Setting a timer before a pop-up displays is a simple and straightforward process that can potentially add great value to your website. At the point when most users leave your website, you can gently guide your visitors toward your product or service or encourage her to sign up for your newsletter to get additional information in the future. By providing a simple form to provide a name and email address, you can increase the conversion rate and decrease the likelihood that emails you send will get returned or sent to your trash.

Choosing the Right Software

Website owners have to carefully manage their time, expenses and resources. Using a full-featured version of a product such as Bounce Exchange may actually hurt the effectiveness of your website. Too many database connections and data flowing between the website server and the visitor can impede the overall user experience. OuiBounce gets around all of this by using a simple, streamlined and effective library that can add an interactive element to your website. Before spending money on an expensive option like Bounce Exchange, it makes sense to explore the Open Source OuiBounce option.

More than ever, content matters, and having the right content on your websites is essential for ranking well in the search engines. In addition, great writing has a number of side benefits that can help improve visitor engagement and tertiary search engine metrics. However, most website operators are not great writers, and even those who are generally have better ways to spend their time. In order to succeed in the search engines, you’ll likely need to hire a freelance writer.

Freelance writers create the content on your website, and there a number of ways to use what they write to help your website rank better. In addition, hiring a freelance writers lets you know that you’ll have someone who is ready to create content when you need it. However, you’ll want to make sure you hire the best freelance writer for your needs. Here are a few tips to consider when looking for freelance writers and great website content.

Why Writing Matters

In the past, Google and the other search engines generally ranked websites based on off-site activity. Links to your website would help it grow, and anchor text could have a profound effect. In recent years, however, Google has developed sophisticated algorithms that help it determine if a website is one that visitors will enjoy. Since Google depends on delivering great results, their algorithms must be able to avoid recommending spammy, uninformative pages. One of the ways they do this is by algorithmically determining if the content on your website is well written.

Nobody knows exactly what goes into the algorithm as its contents are guarded closely, but most experts believe that the writing is checking for spelling errors and even basic grammar. There are a number of formulas that have been developed over the years to determine if writing is readable or not, and most believe that Google uses similar techniques. These days, fooling Google is all but impossible; you need good content that is written well.

What do Freelancers do?

The writing field is notoriously difficult, and many writers don’t have full-time employment. As a result, many depend on freelance writing for part- or full-time income. The Internet has increased demand for freelance writers in recent years, and many perform most of their work online. Website operators looking for writers will find plenty to choose from.

Freelance writers with web experience understand the importance of keywords, and they know how to perform necessary research to ensure that the content they deliver is accurate and reliable. While not all writers have the same skills, most take their jobs seriously and are able to perform great work on a consistent basis. By building a relationship with freelance writers and giving them regular work, you can stock your website with content the search engines will love.

Finding a Freelancer

Fortunately, there are a number of ways to find freelance writers online. Writers will often post on Craigslist, and some also work through third-party websites. These websites allow you to place orders at competitive prices and read the work before choosing to accept it or not. These third-party websites have a variety of different ways to facilitate the workflow, so look around to find which works best for your needs.

Many of these websites also allow you to place orders directly with writers you like best. Even though there is a charge for this service, the final prices are competitive. These websites are also great for those who want content created from different voices, and they allow you to diversify your writing without having to reach out to individual writers. For most, third-party writing websites are a smart choice.

Keeping Your Writers Happy

Great freelance writers often have more job offers than time, so they can often afford to be selective. Because of this, offering significantly less than the writer usually charges will often fail. That said, if you feel that your content should be easy to produce, you may want to see if you can negotiate a discounted rate. Similarly, freelance writers enjoy regular work, and they may offer discounts if you promise to deliver work to them on a regular basis.

One of the top complaints that comes from freelance writers is payment difficulties. The writers you hire depend on prompt payment to pay their bills, so make sure to follow through on promises. Many will also demand half of the final bill upfront, so be prepared to put down a bit of money. Great content is worth paying for, and a happy writer will often go the extra mile to keep you coming back to them in the future.

Hiring an Individual Writer

When hiring an individual writer, it’s important to determine when you’ll deliver work, what you expect and how they will be paid. Be upfront, and try to give your writer examples of the kind of work you need. It’s often best to start with a small order that you can read through their work and determine if the produced content meets your needs. Don’t ask for samples longer than a few hundred words as some website operators use this as a scam to get free work.

Freelance writers generally have portfolios, so ask to see examples of previous work before you hire a writer. There is no universal online test for determining how good a writer is, and you’ll have to use your own judgment before hiring someone. Different writers have different styles, and you’ll want to know that the tone and style they use matches your website.

Using Content

Your main website needs great content, so hire a writer if your content could be better. If you aren’t sure how good the content on your main website is, ask a freelance writer to edit it for you. Even small mistakes can hurt your website in the search engine rankings, and potential customers and clients will find misspelling and basic grammar errors to be signs of poor professionalism. Many websites suffer from basic structural issues; freelance writers can help.

You’ll also need content for your blogs and supporting websites, and you’ll want great content for your social media properties. Freelance writers can help you meet all of these goals, so hire a writer with experience writing for different types of platforms. Doing so can allow you to focus on SEO and advertising campaigns while still having great content delivered for your website.

In the past, it was sometimes possible to get mediocre websites to rank well. These days, doing so is nearly impossible, and Google will eventually sniff out any shortcomings eventually. By focusing on creating great content and hiring great freelance writers, you can separate your website for the competition and see long-term, durable results.

In addition, succeeding on today’s web requires regular updates, and most website operators lack the time or expertise needed to continually create top-notch content. Freelance writers depend on their writing for their livelihood, and their experience can help you succeed online. While they aren’t cheap, the service they provide is worth what they charge, and hiring a freelance writer can be the difference between a website that languishes near the bottom and one that climbs to the top of the rankings.

Many small business owners have built a website, and a large percentage of them have a blog on their website. However, a lot of business owners want to know how often they should be posting to their blog.

There are several reasons why business owners might want to know the answer to this question. One reason to keep a blog fresh is because the major search engines reward fresh content.

Another reason why a business owner might want to know how often to update their blog is because they want to keep new and existing customers satisfied. Fortunately, the answer to this question can be quite vague.

Posting one time per week

A lot of businesses are posting to their blog once every week. Every week, they create a new blog post and add it to their website blog. Small businesses have been doing this for quite some time, and for most of them, it appears to be working quite well.

Why post once per week?

There are several reasons why once per week seems to be the magic solution. One of the main reasons why this works very well is because it’s beneficial for maintaining customer relationships. It’s useful to view a blog as a courtesy call, and this call is sent to all of your profitable, important customers.

When a business owner releases a new blog post, he or she makes sure that the customer is thinking about their business. By posting a new blog post every week, business owners are actually strengthening their relationship with their customers.

Aside from strengthening existing relationships, a weekly blog post will also create a rhythm for the relationship that exists between customers and business owners. In many cases, it almost becomes a ritual. Customers will start to look forward to the weekly blog post, so they will check back at least once per week.

By creating a weekly blog post, the website owner is able to provide useful updates and information to his or her readers. Although this article is primarily for business owners, any website owner can benefit from a weekly posting schedule.

Get a feel for content

By posting at least once every week, website owners create a useful skill. When business owners force themselves to post every week, they’re building a valuable skill, and this skill enables them to constantly think about how they can provide more value to their customers. The new skill gives business owners a competitive advantage.

What weekly blog posts do

There are many benefits of doing weekly blog posts. Such a post can be used to set specific buying criteria. Website and business owners can use a weekly blog post to establish true credibility and authority. They can use weekly posts to explain why customer service is so important.

For search engines

Website and business owners want to keep the search engines happy. A lot of blogs receive the bulk of their traffic from the major search engines, so it only makes sense to want to keep the search engines happy.

It’s nearly impossible to find any conclusive studies that show a specific posting frequency significantly impacts search engine rankings. However, that doesn’t mean it’s acceptable to start posting once per month. Search engines love fresh content, which is why they encourage website owners to update their blog frequently.

However, many people find it interesting that search engines look more closely at writing style than posting frequency. It couldn’t hurt to add new blog posts frequently. From an SEO perspective, there are several benefits to frequently updating a blog. Google absolutely loves fresh content.

By posting at least once per week, website and business owners can keep the search engine spiders coming back frequently. If the search engine spiders are frequently visiting your blog, then they will quickly index your new content.

It’s pretty obvious that content is what drives search engine traffic, so by posting to their blog regularly, website and business owners can increase their search engine traffic. Currently, many people have an infrequent posting schedule.

They might add one post to their blog and wait several weeks before adding more content. Even if you only post one new blog post per week, it’s best to maintain a consistent schedule because it will keep the search engines happy.

It’s great for sharing

There is something that webmasters can learn from the NBA. Basketball has a handful of top scorers, and there is a specific reason why these individuals score more often than most other players.

Put simply, it’s the players who take the most shots who score more than the rest of the players. This is also true for baseball players. Statistics show that the top-scoring baseball players also have the highest number of strikeouts.

Every new blog post gives webmasters the ability to score more points, but in the case of websites, points would be considered traffic. By posting a new blog post every week, website and business owners create more opportunities for their content to be shared, which increases online visibility.

What about every other week?

Many webmasters would like to post once every other week. Although they can post as often as they want, it’s almost pointless to post less than once per week.

A small group of individuals say they do just fine posting once per month, and while it might be working for them, posting once per week seems to be much more effective. If you imagine the main blogs that you visit, then you will probably realize that these blogs are updated every week. There are several other reasons why it’s important to avoid posting less than once per week.

Frequent blogging helps grow business

When you blog often, you’re effectively growing your business. Many studies show that frequent blogging has a significant impact on business growth. Frequent blogging attracts more leads and traffic, and there is plenty of data to back this up.

On average, updating a blog once per week provides double the amount of traffic than blogging less frequently. Studies also show that companies that blog more than 15 times every month can have as much as five times more traffic than companies that don’t.

Small business owners have the most to gain from blogging regularly. By posting at least eight times a month, companies can significantly increase their sales.

What is most important

Some people cannot post more than once every two weeks. What is really important is creating a posting schedule and sticking to it. Consistency is extremely important. At the end of the day, there is no magical posting frequency.

Since every situation is unique, the answer to this question is different for everyone. However, it’s best to post at least once per week. This is the frequency that seems to produce the best results for webmasters and business owners.

If it’s possible for you to post more often than once per week, then you should strive to do so, but it’s crucial to maintain a consistent level of quality. It makes no sense to post once per week if all of the posts provide almost no value.

Now, with SEO and the content game, many struggle to adapt since it seems Google changes their mind all the time. It does not help a site owner that people like Matt Cutts say one thing but mean another. This is a serious problem if you own and run a website or blog. For this reason, you should always do your own research on a variety of topics. In fact, recently, Matt Cutts proclaimed a little duplicate content will not hurt your site’s rankings. When saying duplicate content does not hurt a site, here is what Matt Cutts meant.

Product descriptions

Now, when writing a product description, it is hard to write on with 100 percent unique content. Think about it, if you are writing a 200 word Web page on a garden hose, you are going to struggle to keep things different. In fact, many site owners will copy and paste the description provided by the original manufacturer. This is an easy way to get your pages ready and still have a great product description. Of course, when searching on Google, the content will not rank too highly as it is not unique. For this reason, many site owners opt to change the original content as a way to remain different.

This is a great way for the writer to provide the reader with a completely different and relevant description about the product. On the other hand, if you own and run an e-commerce site with thousands of products, you are going to have a hard time writing new product descriptions. For this reason, many opt to keep this content the same as the manufacturer. When doing so, you will still enjoy decent SEO rankings; however, your site is unlikely to surpass more established blogs and e-commerce sites.

Quoting

As mentioned, when writing some pages, you will want to quote the original writer or manufacturer. Without doing this, you are unlikely to provide the reader with the best possible description of the idea, service or product. To quote, you should, of course, offer everything in detail, mentioned by the original writer. At the same time, you should offer a reference to the quote and a hyperlink. When doing so, you will not run afoul of any rules, written or unwritten. Sadly, many fear duplicate content and end up foregoing this option.

Instead, some site owners will leave out the quote or change its original meaning. When doing this, a site owner is likely to give the reader a less than stellar description. For this reason, instead of fearing the wrath of Google when quoting a source, you should include the hyperlink and attribute the writing to the original author. When doing so, you will not anger the original writer; at the same time, you will provide your reader with the most relevant and interesting information he or she seeks.

Similar keywords and phrases

Now, when running a search on Copyscape, it is easy to see the same results and find duplicate content. This is extremely hard to avoid as there are only so many phrases one can use when writing about a given subject. Think about it, when a writer makes a blog post about a subject, he or she is unlikely to write something unique. Instead, many end up using the same phrase others used in the past. In itself, this is not a huge deal as Google will, naturally, see a writer used his or her own words most of the time. At the same time, while a writer should not worry too much, he or she should make sure to create content in their own words.

Meaning, if a blogger sees a website and wants to write a similar article, he or she must avoid copying and pasting any part of the content. Instead, when writing about a similar subject and researching another site, the writer, at minimum, should write the words in his or her own way. When doing so, a site owner will avoid duplicate content with little effort. Either way, when a writer uses some related keywords and phrases sparingly, he or she should not worry too much as long as it is not part of a larger trend in their writing style.

Usability

In other cases, you will have duplicate content for usability reasons. Think about it, when you run a company with multiple offices throughout the United States, you will have plenty of websites listing the same content. This is okay most of the time as long as a writer provides value to the reader. Remember, when a company has offices all over, it is hard to avoid using the same phrase for plenty of sites. As long as a business does not go overboard with this, it should not suffer any problems. On the other hand, when spamming the Internet with thousands of Web pages that do not vary, one will have problems. For example, some directory sites will list services in every city of the United States. When doing it, at minimum, a company will devalue its own content and cause serious problems. However, if a site owner wants to offer valuable content and information for a few dozen cities, he or she should not fear the wrath of Google and its duplicate content checker.

Multiple sites

Some companies will have many sites. For example, it is often beneficial to have a site for each country, region or state. Of course, when doing this, some major websites will have plenty of duplicate content. This is okay, and Google will simply value the content from both websites. When understanding this, a writer will not have to make two unique versions, or more, of a site. Sadly, many do not understand this and they end up writing a completely different mobile site. When doing this, a site owner will waste valuable time and money. Instead, when realizing how things work, a blogger or writer will not work all the time simply changing his or her content around slightly. Remember, Google knows and understands many businesses will have multiple sites with the same, or very similar, content.

A site owner must understand the truth behind Matt Cutts ideas. Luckily, when a writer knows this, he or she can create a great reading experience without sacrificing quality. While it is wise to understand why duplicate content is bad in most cases, it is wiser to understand it is not always a big deal. No, often, a writer will have little choice to keep things the same. Of course, if a site owner has a hard time seeing his or her duplicate content rise to the top, they will face an uphill battle. Fortunately, an e-commerce site owner can do more to see his or her website rise in the ranks. Then, with an overall wise plan, one can see their site rise to the top of Google. Without a doubt, when understanding all of this and providing plenty of value to the reader, a site owner should not worry too much about falling in the search engine rankings. Simply put, while it is wise to understand what Matt Cutts said, it is also smart to think a little more about his views.

So you’ve been handed a manual action penalty by Google, have you? What have you done, you naughty webmaster? The good news is that you know about it – you may not have even been made aware of the penalty before the 2013 rollout of the manual action viewer within Google Webmaster Tools, so you’re already ahead of a site that was penalized before the rollout. Now, what do you do with this information?

On Google’s Manual Actions page, you will find a brief description of the problem that resulted in your site’s penalization. It is of immense importance that you visit this page and discover the reason for your penalty, as each different type of penalty has its own method of resolution.

Here’s how to view Google’s Manual Action page:

• Click on ‘Search Traffic’ on the Webmaster Tools Dashboard

• Click on Manual Actions

• Note any actions that may be listed

According to Google, your next action is to ‘fix it’ and request a review – but what does ‘fixing it’ entail? That’s what this article is all about.

In general, if you’ve participated in any questionable endeavors to increase your website’s ranking via PageRank, cut it out. We’re not here to judge, but Google takes a certain stance on such actions, and many penalties are the result of such actions. Everyone makes mistakes, but cleaning up after them isn’t always easy.

Some actions impact your whole site, while others only involve a few specific links, and there are different ways of dealing with every sort of action that’s taken. Let’s take a look at each type of manual action penalty, and the methods you can employ to remove your site from Google’s penalty box while working to restore its previous glory (or, at least, it’s previous Google ranking).

Unnatural Links to Your Site – Impacts Links

In this case, your site has been noticed by Google as having a recurring role in a pattern of ‘unnatural, artificial, deceptive, or manipulative’ links that point to, you guessed it, your website. Sometimes this is not the fault of the website itself and, thus, there is no action you can take. Google realizes this and, as such, your site’s ranking is not affected by this particular action.

That said, if you do happen to know of any artificial links to your site, it is certainly in the best interest of your site to do whatever you can to have them taken down. If you don’t explicitly know of any artificial links to your site, search for them and, when you find them, do whatever you can do to have them taken down.

Whether you’ve been able to locate any ‘unnatural’ links removed from your site, look harder. Google has taken this manual action against your site for its own reasons, and it is in your best interest to take action. Google your site’s URL, and if you find any links that don’t seem quite right, do whatever you can to take them down.

The easy method of having these links removed is requesting that the linking site’s webmaster remove them entirely. Unfortunately, this is not always an option, and the question of whether or not you should endeavor to take more drastic routes (e.g. changing the URL of the destination to which the questionable URL linked) depends upon the specific site being linked, and the overall rank of your site. For example, if the link is nested deep within your website’s structure, changing the filename of one page might do the trick; however, if the link is directed towards your root page, and you still have a respectable PageRank, you may not wish to take such an ‘evasive’ approach.

Unnatural Links to Your Site

This is a more serious version of the ‘Unnatural Links to Your Site – Impacts Link’ action, so here are some additional steps you can take in this case.

• Download the list of links to your site from Google’s Webmaster Tools. You can do this via the following route – Links to Your Site > Who links the most > Download more sample links (or) Download more latest links.
• Familiarize yourself with Google’s Webmaster Guidelines, and compare the links that you’ve downloaded to the Google’s guidelines.
• If any links do not meet Google’s guidelines, try to contact the webmaster of the site hosting questioning links to your own, and ask them to remove/prevent the pages hosting those links from PageRank (you might suggest the “rel=’nofollow’ attribute.
• Finally, use the ‘Disavow Links’ tool, within your array of Google’s Webmaster Tools, to ‘disavow’ links that you were not able to have removed.
• Request a reconsideration of your site from Google and wait (patiently) for a response within your Webmaster Tools account

Unnatural Links from Your Site

In this case, you will again wish to revisit Google’s Webmaster guidelines. Remember, knowledge is power! Next, look for links on your site that Google might think you’ve paid for, or that might have violated Google’s Webmaster Guidelines in any other way (excessive link exchanges, for example).

If you found any, either remove them entirely, or use the “rel=”nofollow” attribute to redirect them away from Google’s PageRank algorithms, and request a reconsideration from Google.

Hacked Site

Well, this is no good. No webmaster on Earth wants to wake up to find this action on their Webmaster Tools account. But what on Earth should you do, if you do?

This one goes beyond the scope of this article, unfortunately, but help is out there! As Google says, ‘Unfortunately, it’s likely your site was hacked.’ And they say that right here</a>.

Visit the site linked above (here’s that link again, because if your site has been compromised, we strongly encourage you to visit it: http://www.google.com/webmasters/hacked/). Take all of the necessary actions and precautions.

The short version of Google’s instructions involves taking your website down until the method of attack and the extent of the damage can be reviewed (use Webmaster Tools to help with this process), identify the specific vulnerability that allowed the attack to occur, patch the vulnerability and deal with any recognizable damage, then request a review from Google.

Thin Content with Little or No Added Value

There are a number of reasons this action could have been taken, but they all typically involve associations with low quality, shallow websites. Google has basically deemed your site to be of limited value and low quality, so we do hope that you didn’t spend too much time working on it.

Your first course of action, in this case, is to follow some recommended actions, such as:

• Review Google’s Webmaster Guidelines concerning…

• o Automatically generated content
  o Affiliated programs
  o Scraped content
  o Doorway pages

• Use a service such as CopyScape to identify any content within your site that duplicates content found on any (or any number of) other sites 3. Check your site for doorway pages (pages that have been created for the specific purpose of ‘spamming’ search engines, utilizing certain content to accrue clicks and relay them to a different page)

• Google’s official suggestion, at this juncture, is to ‘think about whether your site provides significant added value for your users.’ This suggestion suggests that Google is interpreting your site as nothing more than an advertisement for another site. If it is, consider other means of promotion. If it is not, find ways to prove it to Google (by, for example, adding unique and valuable content via content brokers such as Textbroker.com).

• Implement Google’s suggestions and request an official review.

Pure Spam

You will only see this, or any of the next few actions, if your website is doing ‘spammy’ type actions of which you’re likely aware. While we can offer our best advice in this matter, Google is rather adept at staying on top of this sort of thing.

If you see the ‘Pure Spam’ action attributed to your site, you’ll want to remove any aggressive spam techniques that may be currently in use on your website. These techniques include scraping content from other sites (thievery), cloaking (black ops), and generated gibberish (trying to fool PageRank). If you wish for your previous PageRank to ever return to normal, it is in your best interest to remove these features from your website.

User-Generated Spam

This one involves users and form sanitization, basically. If you’re flagged with user-generated spam, it’s time to look at any portion of your website in which users can generate content. Forums, profiles, and blog comments are all possible suspects.

Check these areas out. Look for posts, or even profiles, that seem to be advertisements, or even those that include out-of-context content and/or links. Anything that’s user-generated, and doesn’t look like it quite belongs on your site, should be firmly dealt with.

Once you’ve sterilized your user’s content (and hopefully sought methods of keeping it sterile for the immediate future), request a review from Google.

Cloaking and/or Sneaky Redirects

This is a dark area in which we hope that you are not purposely treading. When you are flagged with this action, it means that your site could be showing different pages to viewers than it is showing to Google, or even directing users to different site than those that are shown to Google.

We’re going to assume that you don’t know anything about this, so take the following actions:

• In your Webmaster Tools, use the ‘Fetch as Google’ tool to compare the content that is fetched by Google to the content that is seen by a human user (this would be you) whilst visiting your website.
• If the content differs in any way, immediately remove the portion of your website that is serving different sorts of content to Google than it is to regular viewers (again, you, using the ‘Fetch as Google’ tool).
• If the content differs in any way, immediately remove the portion of your website that is serving different sorts of content to Google than it is to regular viewers (again, you, using the ‘Fetch as Google’ tool).
• Once you’re absolutely, positively sure that your site follows Google’s webmaster guidelines, request a reconsideration from Google. /LIST

Hidden Text and/or Keyword Stuffing

Keyword stuffing is largely considered to be an unethical search engine optimization (SEO) technique, and Google is among those companies who believe it to be unacceptable.

If Google has accused you of keyword stuffing, here’s what to do:

• Using Google’s Webmaster Tools, use the Fetch as Google tool to check your website for content that may be visible to Google’s webcrawler but not to the human user.
• Check the text.

• o Make sure that all of the text on your website is the color that you want it to be, and not the color of your site’s background.
  o Look out for any text that’s hidden in any way, or unavailable due to certain types of CSS styling.
  o Look for text that’s repetitive, or text that doesn’t include any observable, valuable content.

• Find any hidden text? Unhide it. Make it discoverable by both search engines, and human users. If your content is to blame, make sure that it offers a sequentially observable value to regular, human users of your website.
• Re-check your entire site for strings of repetitive text, and remove any redundant data.
• Once your site has been sanitized using the above guidelines, request a reconsideration of your site from Google.

As we wrote earlier, we’re not here to judge, we’re here to help. Google does its best to keep its search results from displaying spammy content that offers little value to users who are searching for meaningful content. The best advice that we can give? Use that to your advantage – the more value you add to your content, and the less tricks you use to draw viewers to your site, the more likely it is that your site will earn a good value within PageRank, and the less likely it is that you’ll be penalized with a manual action.

Has it really been so long? Google Panda, a major shakeup in the world of SEO, was initially rolled out way back in February of 2011. Panda became the most infamous and reviled update among webmasters, a sort of SEO boogeyman that could strike at any time. Panda became the scapegoat for nearly any drop in rankings, and Panda Survival Guides appeared on dozens of sites.

Penguin was a sort of companion piece to the masterwork of Panda. Penguin was announced in April of 2012, over a year later, and it had a lower impact on queries in total. Still, both updates are the most visual and noticeable of Google algorithm changes.

Not Once, but Many Times

Some bloggers talk about Panda and Penguin as if they were one-time events, single large changes in the algorithm that hit like an earthquake and left webmasters reeling. While the initial impact was the largest, both Panda and Penguin are in fact ongoing initiatives. Both updates receive occasional upgrades, changes that continue to affect webmasters to this day.

What Panda Does

Panda is a sort of learning AI that analyzed the input of a crowd-sourced group of human search raters. The AI determined what a good page looked like, what a bad page looked like, and what factors influenced this decision. Google took these results and created the Panda update, which demolished entire industries of low quality content mills and scraper webpages.

The Panda History

The first implementation of Panda was in February 23, 2011. Affecting a full 12 percent of all searches, this update destroyed businesses and irrevocably changed the world of SEO forever.

From that date onwards until October of 2011, Google pushed out a Panda update about once a month, typically in the third week of the month. These updates were all comparatively minor, enhancing and refining the core of Panda.

In October, Google implemented Panda Flux. They began updating Panda much more frequently, on the order of every week or two. Larger updates still appeared about once each month.

In September of 2012, the SEO industry stopped numbering Panda updates with a version iteration and began simply counting them. Only major updates were counted — the minor Panda Flux continuing updates were left unnamed. The updated pushed on this date was labeled Panda #20.

March 14, 2013: Panda #25. This update was announced by Matt Cutts to be the last major Panda update before the core functionality of Panda was added to the general Google search algorithm.

June 11, 2013: Panda Dance. Matt Cutts reveals that, though the updates are not necessarily announced, Panda is still updating on a monthly basis. Each update rolls out over a ten-day period, to allow for gradual changes and recovery.

What Penguin Does

Penguin is a different sort of algorithm update than Panda, but it impacted a rather significant number of queries; around 3.1 percent according to Google. It was designed as a webspam countermeasure, removing spam sites and content scrapers from the rankings. Legitimate sites, even those with sub-par SEO, were not affected by Penguin.

The Penguin History

April 24, 2012: The first implementation of Penguin.

May 25, 2012, one month later: Penguin 1.1, a refinement of Penguin data. It was a confirmation from Google that data was being processed outside the core algorithm, much like Panda at the beginning. This allowed Penguin to work with a database that did not necessarily connect directly to search reality. Penguin data occasionally refreshes to allow the algorithm to keep up to date, but these data refreshes are invisible and unannounced.

October 5, 2012, three months later: Penguin #3. Adopting the counting scheme of Panda updates, industry experts labeled this the third Penguin update. After three times as long between updates as the previous Penguin iteration, industry experts speculated that Penguin #3 would be a major update. In reality, it affected less than half of a percent of all queries, making it relatively minor. Industry experts rebooted the naming scheme similar to Panda, but Google, in subsequent updates, reverted to their own version iterations.

May 22, 2013, seven months later: Penguin 2.0, the fourth major Penguin update. It was a long time in coming, and hyped up as a major update by the industry. In reality, the update had minimal impact. Analysis of the update seemed to indicate that Penguin was now operating at a per-page level, rather than the previous site-wide level. Now, individual pages could be penalized and drag the whole site down.

October 4, 2013, five months later: Penguin 2.1, the fifth Penguin update. The changes to Penguin itself were minimal; rather, it was a data update to refresh Google’s databases for use with Penguin. Penguin seems to be working exactly as it has in the past, with this update forming more of a database refresh than an algorithm change.

The Takeaways

Panda is a major, long-running update. As such, Google continually analyzes incoming data and incorporates it into the algorithm. Panda has, fairly consistently, updated once each month since its creation in 2011. Modern Panda updates are rolled out over a ten-day period in order to soften the blow to companies reliant on search traffic, and to allow webmasters time to notice a penalty and act to recover from it as quickly as possible. It is unclear whether the Panda Flux initiative, which rolled out frequent updates on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, is still active. If so, Panda may be updating as often as every week. As part of the core Google search algorithm, Panda is a critical component of search accuracy today. Constant updates keep up with sites trying to work around the penalties rather than follow the rules of recovery and growth.

Penguin is a much smaller, more focused update. As such, it updates rather infrequently. With only five significant updates since its creation in 2012, Penguin updates have been slowing down. Barring some important change in the field of SEO, Penguin will likely continue to update once every five or six months.

Both algorithm changes have micro-updates that are rolled in to the other Google algorithm updates. These major update packs tend to happen all at once, with Google announcing a 10-pack, 20-pack or even as high as a 52-pack of updates rolled into one. These updates are difficult to analyze, and individual aspects of Panda and Penguin may be rolled into them. In these cases, the tweaks to either ongoing update are minor and barely noticeable.

Panda is a fast-acting, fast-reacting algorithm that directly combats instances of black hat SEO and negative SEO that come up as the industry evolves. It has to be agile and reactive in order to keep up to date. It is now part of the core of Google’s search algorithm, and as such, does not require the same kind of data refreshing that Penguin does. Penguin, meanwhile, is aimed at spam content sites and other sites with a black and white distinction. These are easier to recognize, and Penguin does not need to update as often to continue to catch them. Of course, these are not all of the updates Google performs; the algorithm updates on average 500 times per year.

Google+ is known to be one of the fastest growing social media platforms in the world that many companies, both small and large, are jumping at the chance to join in on. Its world began in 2011 as a test case. They started out with only 150 invitations to join and in a span of two years, they now has more than 400 million members.

What is Google+ All About?

Google+ is a social networking and identity site owned and operated by Google, Inc. It was described as a social layer that enhances many of its online properties. It is more than a networking site but also a tool that focuses on SEO as it meets social needs. It is the second largest social networking site in the world after Facebook. It is used by over 400 million people who interact socially via Google+ enhanced properties like Gmail, YouTube, and the +1 button.

Google+ combined some of the better aspects of both Facebook and Twitter. Users are able to post content, pictures and status updates which will show up on other users’ news feeds – like Facebook. At the same time, Google+ users can follow anyone without having to first send that person a friend request – similar to Twitter.

After an initial period spent learning more about how Google+ works, it was found that it is a really great source of links that can be used for SEO purposes, which is why many larger companies are currently using Google+. It is quite interesting to see Google opting to allow links that pass through page rank higher, unlike other social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter that allow links that are not search engine friendly, making it hard for Google spiders to follow. This gives this website an edge amongst other sites and is more likely to continue growing in popularity.

But the question is do most large companies use Google+ strictly for SEO?

For the past few years, many experts have heavily debated on Google+ and its role in benefiting companies via social media. Even though some people opposed its likelihood in meeting a company’s SEO needs. According to research conducted by GlobalWebIndex, Google+ is the second largest and popular social media platform with majority of big companies using it.

Big companies using Google+

• • BBC News: Well known by viewers all over the world. They are using Google+ to reach out to their viewers
• • Intel: An American semiconductor chip maker and using Google+ to help further its cause
• • Macys: An American shopping icon, using coupons to attracts customers on Google+
• • Marvel Comics: One of the biggest businesses on Google+
• • Toyota: A global auto manufacturer, doing well on Google+

Why are most large companies using Google +?

With Larry page (Google+ Co-Founder) confirming its popularity recently, it can only be assumed that its value in generating SEO friendly links has become and can continue becoming more important.

Benefits of Google+ To Companies Include:

1. 1. Search Engine Friendly

This media focuses more on SEO than on other aspects. This means that a company gets great SEO opportunities by using it. They can do this by sharing pages in their website on a Google+ page and the business will be ranked higher in the search engine results. This gives them a competitive edge against their counterparts.

1. 2.SEO Ranking

A major reason why many big companies are using Google+ is because its content counts toward overall SEO ranking. This is because Google indexes its contents the same way it does for web pages. This means that when one posts on Google+, the content is searchable and it ends up being ranked higher in the search engine results. The content also stays there for a longer time compared to when content is posted on other social platforms like Facebook or Twitter. Once content is viewed by many visitors, it gets more links and ends up being ranked higher, thus increasing a company’s performance.

1. 3. Easier To Reach Influencers

One of the things making Google+ popular amongst big companies is how new it is. This allows a person to take time to figure out what they want to post. There are numerous influencers in Google and with not too large an audience to reach out to yet; companies are able to start building an effective relationship with these influencers.

1. 4. Share More Efficiently

If a company’s clients are using Google+, they can be able to target the company’s content more easily and efficiently compared to other social networks. With the use of Google+ circles , one can be able to categorize followers similar to a mailing list. This enables a company to post content to the entire audience or to specific circles that one chooses.

1. 5. Google Hash Tags

Hash tags have helped big companies in ranking their websites high. They make sure to include hash tags as part of their content strategy. A company can post content on their Google+ account by throwing in a few hash tags to help in supporting their post. This acts as a great way to optimize the post for organic search by using the optimized words as hash tags. Hash tags are important in that, when content is posted on Google+, a company is not only able to reach Google+ followers but also those outside that network in an effective and targeted way.

1. 6. Ability To Post On YouTube

This is another big reason why many big companies are using Google+ for SEO purposes. YouTube comments are now integrated with Google+. When a company uses YouTube, it will be able to reach out to more potential customers and will eventually be ranked higher in the search engines.

1. 7. Flexibility In Link Placement For SEO

• (a)Google+ Posts

Posting is one of the most used features by users. Links that are found here are valuable for SEO. This is the place where the most dynamic links can be found and content posted here gets maximum optimization.

• (b)About Me Section

This is in every user’s profile and can include SEO beneficial links. These static links ends up being of more value than those in Google+ posts. The Majority of big companies such as Amazon, Best Buy, Overstock and Walmart have these pages set up and use it specifically for SEO, which is why they are dominating the SERPs.

So, do most large companies use Google+ strictly for SEO? The answer is obviously yes! This is because Google is well known for having the most relevant search results on the internet, making Google+ a top option for SEO related purposes.

Due to Google+ proven effectiveness, it is possible to see more search minded brands encouraging their customer to engage with their products through Google+ as a way of directing valuable links to their website. After seeing how many people are on this platform, one can now understand why big companies are using it. More and more companies are expected to launch their Google+ pages as well for their SEO purposes. If Google continues to integrate Google+ into its products, companies using the platform will continue benefiting, more people will turn to Google, and in the near future it is possible they will surpass Facebook.

In the past, people would try everything they could to land on the first pages of Google. While many techniques used to work, some are not effective and may end up hurting the site owner. At the very least, when trying old and useless methods, a site owner will waste his or her time and resources. For this reason, you should know that article directories are basically useless. Here are eight reasons why this is the case and what happened to cause this.

Low quality

First and foremost, most article directory sites do not offer a lot of high quality articles. No, instead, these web ties provide a place for people to spam their information and articles full of links and overused keywords. While Google liked this in the past, the search engine giant has caught on and now punishes people who use article directories. Think about it, when you land on a directory site, you will see dozens of categories and thousands of uninteresting and spun articles that nobody reads. For this reason, most search engines devalue that content and do not take this into account when coming up with organic search rankings.

Too easy to manipulate

Since most article directories do not require a person to offer much, they are not too valuable to anyone. In reality, when going to an article site, all you need to do is upload your content. Other times, some will charge a small fee. Either way, since this is an easy method for people to manipulate the search rankings, Google has mostly realized that the articles are unoriginal and will not value them highly. However, if you go to a high PR website, you can upload articles and still get something out of the experience. Of course, this will largely depend on your quality of writing.

Content quality

Now, more than ever, people think they can write and put it all over the Internet. It seems almost everyone has a blog where they spew their opinions and talk about their interests. In reality, to most people, this is not interesting. Furthermore, since most people are not good writers, this causes problems when trying to take advantage of article directories. To understand this, you only need to head to an article directory site. Then, if you read two or three pieces, you will understand most people do not know how to create something that people enjoy. In some cases, the piece was actually written by a machine. Either way, when understanding that the content is of low quality, you should have no trouble understanding why article sites are a waste of time.

Too many links

Now, when making an article, some writers will do it wisely and put in one or two high quality links to relevant sources. On the other hand, many use article directory sites as a way to list multiple links in their story. While it is okay to offer one or two links, the writer should keep it simple and avoid sounding unprofessional by offering a dozen or more links. Since Google will not take kindly to this, you must understand how to provide the right amount of links to your website. When you do this, you can write an article that both your readers and the search engines will love.

Hundreds of sites

At first, there were not a lot of article directory sites on the Internet. Now, with the explosion of information and the need to land on the first page of Google, many sites sprang up. While this was god for some people, it has had a detrimental effect on the quality of these websites. Think about it, there are now thousands of websites where you can upload your article. This is not good as so many of these places are just a thinly veiled attempt at cheating the system. Of course, if you choose a good site to upload your articles to, you have a good chance to get something out of the experience as some sites still offer value.

Other metrics are now more important: Now, when looking at SEO, you will notice that people always change their minds about what works. There is a reason for this as Google will make updates where they devalue some things and add value to others. For this reason, if you are relying on article content marketing to get to the top, you are in for a rude awakening. Now, you must have a flawless site with plenty of useful content. Not only that, you should have relatively few links. Of course, when getting links, you should only concentrate on high quality as this is what matters. Finally, with social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, you can gain in the rankings and see your site do well. For this reason, article directories are largely ignored by people who want to rise to the top. Simply put, there are other more effective ways to gain in the organic search rankings.

Everyone trying

In all truth, you should try to stay head of the SEO game. This is harder than most people realize. However, if two years ago you started concentrating on quality content and great links, you would sit on the first page of Google for many search terms. Sadly, most follow the overall trends and they end up on the back pages of Google. For this reason, it is obvious that article directories are largely inefficient since most people use them in their day-to-day SEO strategies. Instead, by concentrating on quality and value, a site owner can rise in the ranks without having to resort to ineffective methods that are largely harmful.

Filled up

Think about it, most possibilities have already been discovered. Meaning, when writing an article, it is nearly impossible to write it from an original standpoint. For this reason, you will not get much out of article marketing unless you are an incredible writer who speaks about subjects people want to understand. You must understand that most sites are full of the same articles and ideas. Nothing is going to change, and you are not likely to go above and beyond the other writers. Not only that, when looking at older articles, you will have an uphill battle as they enjoy plenty of SEO link juice since they have been around so much longer. Simply put, the battle has been waged, and unless you can knock off the person on top, you should largely ignore article directories.

When looking to SEO, you must understand what works and what fails to get results. Sadly, some people are stuck in the past and think about what used to work. This is a serious error in judgment as many of the old methods are simply a waste of time. Sadly, many perpetuate this myth and wonder why their site was hit by the latest update. Rather than fix the underlying issue and find out what no longer works, many opt for the same approach and hope things improve. This is foolish, and if you want to regain your rankings, you must understand that things like article directories are largely irrelevant. Instead, you should look to the future.

It should be obvious that link building has its place. However, the SEO landscape is constantly evolving, but over the years, quality content has remained a constant.

A lot of webmasters are making the mistake of focusing solely on link building, and in many situations, this decision has produced catastrophic consequences. There is a long list of reasons why you should be focusing most of your time on creating quality content.

Insulation from the Algorithms

To combat the never-ending army of web spam, search engines have been forced to release several different algorithms. Since Google controls the largest market share, it has been the search engine that has released all of the different algorithm updates.

Many of these updates were specifically created to target websites that manipulate search engine rankings. There is a laundry list of practices that these algorithms target, but as of late, the major target for Google is link building.

Penguin is an algorithm that was created to target aggressive link building, and it caused a monumental shift in the way webmasters build links. It would be silly to think that Google is going to stop with the Penguin algorithm. In fact, it’s very likely that Google will continue to create and roll out new algorithms, which are aimed at combating link building.

Anyone who understands SEO knows that it’s nearly impossible to gain 100 percent protection from existing and future algorithm updates, but by focusing on content more than link building, webmasters will gain a layer of insulation against future updates. Over the long-term, placing more emphasis on content than link building is the better option.

Results from Content Are Measurable

It’s extremely difficult to directly measure the value of a link. However, it’s fairly easy to measure the value of a piece of content. Even if a certain links boosts traffic and keyword rankings, it’s still very hard to measure the value of that link.

The problem is that measuring the value of a link requires the consideration of several different factors. On the flipside, it’s easy to see how many links a particular piece of content has garnered. It’s also easy to see how many referrals and social shares generated by a piece of content.

The number of organic search visitors that a piece of content has attracted is also measurable. With the right software, it’s even possible to see exactly how much revenue a piece of content has generated. If a webmaster wants to see how much money an article made them, they won’t have much trouble getting this information.

Content Is Cheaper Than Link Building

It’s much cheaper to hire someone to produce content than it is to hire someone to build links. It can cost a lot of money to find good link builders, and this money can generate more revenue when spent on content.

Although it’s not too hard to find a decent SEO company, it’s especially hard to find quality link builders. There are endless places to find high-quality copywriters, and these individuals will provide their services for an affordable price. At the end of the day, it’s almost always cheaper to buy content than links.

It’s Completely Natural

One of the reasons why you should be focusing more on content than link building is because it’s natural. It’s true that building links is mandatory. However, focusing primarily on content is much more natural. The major search engines tell webmasters that they shouldn’t be building links.

What many webmasters don’t understand is that creating content and building links don’t have to be separated. Quality content is capable of garnering natural links. Although it might not work very well in some industries, it can pay off handsomely in many industries.

Content can generate social shares and links, but it needs to be good. Not every piece of content that you write is going to be good. In fact, there is a good chance that a lot of it might suck.

However, if you focus more time on building content, then you give yourself a better chance to create content that will go viral and generate plenty of links.

The Scalability

An excellent reason to focus on content more than link building is because it’s scalable. An enormous amount of resources is required to build a large team of SEOs.

When building such a team, there are several ways to fail. It doesn’t matter if you’re writing your own content or hiring a team of content writers; content is much easier to scale than link building.

If you’re building a team, it’s much easier to find copywriters than link builders, and if you need to replace someone, copywriters are easily replaced while link builders are much harder to replace. Even if you’re a one-man show, content is easier to scale than link building.

It’s Enjoyable

Link building can be a very tedious process. It requires great attention to detail, and at the end of the day, it’s really not very fun. When you focus more on content, you can actually have fun.

Sifting through endless rows of data in an excel sheet is not something you might consider fun. Producing quality content can be a lot more fun, and it can be even more rewarding to connect to people and share the content that you’ve produced.

Why Content Is So Important

It’s not hard to find someone on the Internet talking about quality content. However, despite how often this phrase is brought up, many webmasters choose to ignore it. People have actually heard the phrase so many times that they’re starting to block it out when they hear it.

To get the most out of SEO, producing content is crucial. Even if you go out and build enough links, you still need quality content. Many people say content is king, and although it can get irritating, it’s completely true.

Even if Google dominates search, there is something that all search engines have in common; they want to supply their users with quality content. After all, people use search engines because they crave content. If you’re focusing all of your time on building links, then you’re not really helping the search engines.

Ultimately, the people who use search engines demand quality content, and if you give them this content, the search engines are doing everything they can to reward you. It’s true that building links is important. Every website needs a handful of quality backlinks to gain traction, but after you’ve got some traction, focusing on content can be far more lucrative than focusing most of your time on link building.

It doesn’t matter if you’re a one-man army or an agency. The positive effects of quality content can be measured, and while it’s certainly possible to put a value on a link, significantly more effort is required to put a value on a link. At the end of the day, everyone is looking for a ROI.

There is no doubt that link building produces a measurable ROI, but by putting a greater emphasis on your content, you can almost always achieve a much higher ROI. Both webmasters and business owners can benefit greatly by choosing to allocate most of their available resources to content production and not link building.