Q: How do I stop the search engines from indexing a sub domain?

A: So you have your main domain (www.yourdomain.com) and now you have created a sub domain (sales.yourdomain.com)

If you do not want the search engines to index your sub domain - here is what you have to keep in mind.

1. Search engines see sub domains as a different site completely.

So www.yourdomain.com and sales.yourdomain.com are two completely different sites in a search engines mind - and therefore you would require a separate robots.txt file.

NOTE: A robots.txt file is basically a text file that tells the search engines
a) what files/folders to index
b) what files/folders not to index
c) where your sitemap is located

Why would you want to block search engines from certain pages of your site?

- if the page contains little or no content (eg. such as a login page)
- if the page contains just images (images that you don't want indexed)
- privacy pages
- when your site is still in development (eg. under construction page)

All these pointed mentioned above can impact your search engine rankings if you do not set up a robots.txt file to block these type of pages.

If Google (spider) comes to your site and all it sees is an under construction page - your site is already hit negatively.

A robots.txt file saves the search engines time - and lets them know what pages not to waste their time on - so they can spend more time on going to the higher quality pages of your website more frequently.

OK I mentioned before that Google will see sub domains as different sites.

However, it really depends on how the sub domain was set up.

If sales.yourdomain.com goes to the main web directory (as www.yourdomain.com) – you would then need a script to redirect it – and this method only requires one robots.txt file

If the sub domain was created from the DNS – then you would need two separate robots txt file.

If you are not sure - you can always log into your Google Webmaster Tools account - and under the Tools Section – there is a section called ‘Analyze Robots.txt’ – which will verify if you have blocked the sub domain accordingly.

Q: Title, Description, Keywords Tag: The How To's

OK first of all - the keywords tag is almost irrelevant now. Hardly any of the major search engines look at this tag anymore. In fact, some of the search engines just use this tag to see if you are spamming.

Really, you need to focus on the Title and Description tags.

When you define the title and description for a page, this is what is seen to users if your site does come up on the search results.


So if your Title and Description are boring, or not descriptive enough, not compelling, chances are people are not going to click on it regardless of where you rank.

So it is very important you put the keyword phrase you wish to rank for at the beginning of the title tag and include it in your description tag as well.

Your description should also include some sort of call to action. For instance, you might want to include "click here to find out more"This alone will compel the user to take actions.

Here are some important points you should consider about these tags:

• The title and description for each page of your site should be unique
• The beginning of your title tag should contain your keyword phrase
• The description tag should contain your keyword phrase
• The description tag should include a 'call to action'
• Do NOT put your company name at the beginning of your title tags.

This is actually a common mistake. Most companies put their business names at the beginning of each of their title tags.

So what is wrong with putting your company name at the beginning of each title tag?

1. First of all - if you are not branded people will not be searching for your company name - they will be searching for your product or service
2. Secondly, there is a limited about of characters you can define in the title tag - so you are wasting advertising space by putting your company name at the beginning and having all your good keyword phrases following it
3. If the first 3 words if your title tags of each page begin the same way (with your company name) - this can raise a red flag to Google that you are potentially spamming - even though the content on the page is different. You can actually use Google Webmaster Tools to see if Google feels you are spamming any of your tags.

Baltej Gill
Let's Chat SEO Member

Lets Chat SEO Reveals the Latest Internet Marketing Secrets!

Wondering what SEO methods work? Are you still not on the first page of Google? Come join Lets Chat SEO (letschatseo.com) where you will find the latest Internet Marketing Tips, Practices, and Information that will keep you on the top rankings. Just a few minutes of reading a day can help you understand and build your online business presence.

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Blog Pinging - A Must

OK, chances are if you are reading this blog - you have some knowledge as to what they are and why so many people are using them. In fact, they say that every 1/2 second a blog is created.

Search engines love blogs, primarily because of these factors:

• blogs contain fresh and new content
• blogs contain links
• blogs are updated on a frequent basis

In fact, many blogs get crawled several times a day, and are in Google's index in just minutes after they are published.

Question: So how do these blog postings get indexed so quickly?

Answer: The answer is pinging. A ping lets the search engines and blog engines know that you have updated your blog - so they will come to your site to download or crawl the latest information you have posted.

Follow these simple steps to have your blog cralwed quickly and affectively.

1. Post on a regular basis (whether its once a day, once a week, once every two weeks - try to keep it somewhat consistant) This will train the search engines on their own when to come back.
2. After you publish your blog, go to a http://www.pingomatic.com/
3. Put in your Blog Name, the URL, and click on 'Send Pings'

That's It! The ping will let everyone know that you have made a new post.

If your blog is brand new - do this but also use Google Blog Ping by going to http://blogsearch.google.com/ping

Baltej Gill
Search Engine Marketing

How Do You Get Quality Links?

The best way to get one way backlinks is to have content on your site that people want to link to.

I know that sounds so vague - but really in the long run this will work.

If you have information on your site that is of value - why would people not want to link to you?

Blogging , Social Bookmarking, Social Networking , submitting to directories , even YouTube videos are all great ways you can receive backlinks at no cost but of great value.

Just keep in mind, traditionally Google looks at the following when it comes to backlinks.

1. Where did the link come from? Is it an authoritative site? For example, a .edu or .gov domain
   
2. What type of website did the link come from? Is it the same theme or industry of your site? This will have higher value.
   
3. What is the PR (Page Rank) of the site giving you the link
   
4. What link text is used to link to you - and where that link is placed (is it on the homepage or is it on a page that contains 100 other outbound links?)

If you do receive a link from another site - you want to make sure that the search engines are able to crawl the link.

Some sites purposely block links from being indexed even though they are visible on the page.

How to check to ensure a link being sent to you from another site is crawled

1. Go to the website containing the link to your domain.
   
2. Right click anywhere on the page and click on View Source
   
3. Push 'Ctrl + F' and type in your domain and click on 'Find Next'
   
4. You should now see something like:
   
   (a href="http://www.yourdomain.com/") Your Keyword Phrase (/a)
   
5. If you see the words 'No Follow' in this line - that means search engines will NOT follow the link.

Here is an example of a link that will not be crawled be the search engines.

(a href="http://www.yourdomain.com/" rel="nofollow")Your Keyword Phrase (/a)

How To See What Websites Are Linking To You:

1. Use Google Webmaster Tools (If you are not sure what this is read my older post)
   
2. Go to google and do a search for: link:http://www.yourdomain.com
   
3. Go to yahoo and do a search for: link:http://www.yourdomain.com

Yahoo will show you almost all the domains that are linking to you - wheras Google will only show selected one. However Google Webmaster Tools will allow you to view the complete list as well.

Incoming links are important - and a quick test to see the power of incoming links is by going to Google and doing a search for the term: Click Here

When you search for Click Here in Google, the #1 result that comes up is Adobe Acrobat.

Nowhere does Adobe have the words 'Click Here' in their domain, their title, their description, their content etc yet they are ranking #1 for that term because so many websites have linked to that page with the term Click Here To Download Adobe Reader

Amazing right?

On another note - there was a time that so many people linked to President Bush's website with the term Miserable Failure - that when you did a search for this term in Google, George Bush's website was the #1 result.

OK now that you know this - don't get carried away and get all these websites to link to you with the same phrase. As I mentioned before use variations and make it look natural to the search engines.

Happy linking.

Baltej Gill

Link Building - How To Do It Properly

In a nutshell, link building involves 2 factors - internal links and external links.

Many people overlook the fact that the way you link from one page to another is very important.

For instance, let's pretend you are selling digital cameras - and you have a great review on the new Panosonic Lumix TZ50 that you would like to place on your site.

From an SEO perspective, you want to ensure:

• the page name contains Panosonic Lumix TZ50 (eg. www.yourdomain.com/panosonic-lumix-tz50.aspx)
  
• the title, description and keyword contain Panosonic Lumix TZ50
  
• the H1 Header tag is used and contains the phrase Panosonic Lumix TZ50
  
• the first sentence or paragraph in body contains the phrase Panosonic Lumix TZ50
  
• ALT tag on images contain Panosonic Lumix TZ50
  
• internal links pointing to this page with the anchor text Panosonic Lumix TZ50
  
• external links pointing to this page with the anchor text Panosonic Lumix TZ50

So what do the last two points actually mean?

Instead of linking to the page with the words 'Click Here' , you would want to use the keyword phrase.

If I told you there was a link on my homepage and the link text was 'click here' - without reading what I wrote before the 'Click Here' would you be able to tell what information would be displayed on the page once you click on that link? The answer is no.

On the other hand, if there was a link on my page and the link text was Panosonic Lumix TZ50 - you can be sure that when you click on that link it will take you to a page about Panosonic Lumix TZ50.

The search engines read these links the same way.

External links work the same way - but you just want to be careful that you don't have ALL your incoming links with the exact same link text. Use variations so it looks natural.


Baltej Gill
Social Marketing Works

Google Webmaster Tools - A Must

I cannot stress this point any further. If you already have not subscribed for Google Webmaster Tools (by the way it is free) - stop reading this post and go do it now!



Why Use Google Webmaster Tools?

• It's FREE


• Google will tell you information about your pages


• Google will tell you what keyword phrases you are ranking for


• Google will tell you what keyword phrases visitors are clicking on


• Google will tell you when they last came to your site


• Google will tell you if they have any problems indexing your pages

This list can go on and on - but let's take a few moments and talk about what I have mentioned so far.

First of all , Google will let you know when they last crawled your site!

This is extremely important. Yes - there are other ways you can check - such as looking at the cached pages in Google's index (If you are not sure how to do this - just let me know)

But imagine this - let's pretend you are ranking #10 for your keyword phrase and you want to improve your rankings.

So you start changing the title, description, adding more content, creating links etc etc.,

How long do you wait for now to see results? Is it 1 month? 1 week? 1 day?

Let's say you wait a few days and you do not see any results.

So then you go back and make some more changes - and now Google finally comes around to visit your site.

Now - your rankings improved and you are at position #9.

But what if the first changes you made brought you up to #3? or #1 ?

You would not know - because you already made more changes to your site before Google had a chance to come back and evaluate you.

OK I won't elaborate on that point any more - but knowing when Google is coming back to your site is important.

Google Will Let You Know What You Are Ranking For

Is there any tool out there that will let you know this? Yes there are plenty of tools where you can input in your keywords and it will know where you rank - but what if you are ranking for phrases and terms you did not even realize? Have a look at the screenshot below where Google is displaying what keyword phrase and what position the site is ranking for within the last 7 days.

There still is so much other tools/features Google Webmaster Tools has to offer than what I have just posted - and if you are interested in hearing more about this particularly, or if you wish to be a contributor to this blog - please send an email to baltej1911@hotmail.com

Baltej Gill
Social Media Works

Getting Indexed Quick - And I Mean Quick

OK - so we all want our sites indexed right? How long does it take for search engines to index your site? Months? Weeks? Days?

What if I told you that you can literally start getting exposure within hours - and sometimes even minutes.

After launching my first post just a few hours ago - I also posted about this blog on Yahoo Answers - and in just minutes my post on Yahoo Answers which contained information about my blog and my link got indexed in Google.

Have a look at the screenshot below:



So what does this mean to you?

Are you tired of waiting for the search engines to find your site?



If I wrote this post months ago - I would tell you that to get quickly indexed in Google to do the following:

1. Get incoming links (This will help you gain exposure and Google loves to follow links)
2. Submit your site to Google Webmaster Tools
3. Run a PPC Campaign on your site (This will let Google know you are not a SPAM site)
4. Submit site to directories (DMOZ, Yahoo Directory etc)
5. Submit site to search engines directly

Again - I stress you still follow these methods - but if you want quick results, and I mean within hours or minutes, you want to participate in blogs, social networking sites, etc.,

Remember - once you have created your blog - you want to let all the blog search engines know you exist- so you need to do something which is called 'ping' them.

Every time you add to your blog, make sure you go to http://pingomatic.com/ and 'ping' your site.

Happy blogging.

Baltej Gill
Social Marketing Works

Social Marketing 2.0

Blogs, Web 2.0, Social Marketing, RSS, Bookmarking - are all these just buzz words or really do they mean something?

The truth is - Social Marketing is really taking over traditional SEO. Many blog sites and social networking sites are already climbing their way to the top of the search engines.

For instance, do a search in Google for one of your favourite songs. I would be surprised if the top page results did not include a YouTube video.

Can you imagine the impact a simple 2 minute video can have on your business?

Traditional SEO would require you to keyword research, optimize your title, description and keyword tags, then develop rich content with the right amount of keyword density, proximity and the list goes on. Oh wait - don't forget to include your keywords in the header tag, in link text, and of course build a linking strategy for both internal and external links.

Don' get me wrong - following traditional SEO methods is still very important - but be aware that Web 2.0 is simply not a buzz word - and you are soon if not already going to start seeing the impact of websites that are taking advantage of this technology.

Social Networking sites like Facebook and MySpace are not just sites where teenagers gossip about their boyfriends or girlfriends or how they got sick of the food they ate last night - but can be used as a community where you can inform, promote and discuss your products and services.
So what does this all mean? How can you leverage off these social networking sites and tools?

Stay tuned and you won’t have to worry about being left behind.

Thanks for reading and opting into Web 2.0

Baltej Gill
Social Marketing Works