Internet Building Codes Blog

Imagine the horror when you learn that your site has been removed from Google’s listings and your company begins to bleed.  That frightening scenario happens everyday for companies around the globe.  Google has become such a monster that many businesses are completely reliant upon them for their revenue stream.  How can you avoid becoming the next victim?

Diversify.  If your company is like many others, your livelihood may revolve around Google and the traffic that they are sending you.  But when Google shifts their algorythm, and they do it all the time, your site could fall off and your traffic and sales will follow.  If you diversify your traffic streams and get a little from affiliates, a little from smaller search engines, a little from other sites that link to you and some from Google, you’ll be in a much better position to defend yourself when the moster decides to attack.

Wishing you a happy Halloween…

Chadd Bryant

It’s ironic that as I was sitting down to write this post, I just received an email from someone asking for assistance. Unfortunately, their company purchased a website from one of the nations largest, and well-known web development companies (also known for their SEO services), but the site was a disaster. If you had a chance to read yesterday’s post about keywords, you know now that using the same list of keywords on every page is a no-no. Well, that’s exactly what this so-called SEO firm did. Now this poor company has spent tens of thousands of dollars and has a site that’s programmed poorly, has keywords that are potentially harming it in Google’s rankings and frankly, looks like trash too.

They’ve come to the IBCC looking for assistance as they begin to fight the invoices that keep arriving. They’ve paid everything except for the final bill, but now that they have the website in hand, feel that they shouldn’t have to pay the final bill because they are going to re-do the whole site.

The IBCC generally doesn’t get involved in litigation matters but this case seems blatantly negligent. This company has definitely become the victim of SEO malpractice and needs our assistance. I’d welcome your thoughts as to whether or not a company should be held responsible for final payments if they are dissatisfied with the final product. Is the web development firm responsible to assure that the client is satisfied before they send the final invoice. Let me know your thoughts.

Until tomorrow…

I see it all the time.  People come up with a long list of keywords and they use that keyword string in the title and meta keywords.  And then they copy that page again and again as they open it and change the content to create another page.  Sounds like it would work fine, but when you have a long list of 100 phrases on the page, your keyword density becomes so dulted that the site has little relevance for any of the terms.

You’re actually going to find that your results are much better if you take those phrases and focus on one phrase per page.  Just choose on of the phrases and use it in the title, the headline, the content on the page, the meta keywords, ALT tags, comments etc.  Then choose another phrase and focus on that one on another page.  Then when someone is searching for your phrase, Google is more likely to see your page that’s dedicated to that phrase as more relevant that the other guy who just mentioned the phrase once.

Here’s the other benefit.  If you use a long list of words that are not actually mentioned in the page itself, then Google may think you’re trying to cheat or manipulate their search results.  You know what that means?  You could be delisted.  So be sure that the words that you list in your meta tags, are also found in the content of that page.

Until tomorrow…

Chadd Bryant

Do you ever feel like when you get a proposal, it spells out exactly what you WILL get but never tells what you WON’T get?  Here’s a quick list of things to be sure to steer clear of when designing your site.

Your site should NOT:

1.    contain Java applets
2.    exceed 7% keyword density
3.    link to “bad neighborhoods”
4.    use meta refresh tags
5.    contain poison words or phrases
6.    use excessive cross linking within the same C Block
7.    use duplicate content
8.    target more than five keyword phrases per page
9.    use cloaking techniques
10.    use session IDs
11.    use Flash menus
12.    use frames
13.    use single pixel links
14.    use invisible text
15.    use keywords in the meta tags that don’t appear on the page itself
16.    generate inbound links through image maps
17.    generate inbound links through Javascripts
18.    pay for links
19.    contain broken links
20.    have any misspelled words
21.    produce browser errors
22.    contain more than 100 external links per page
23.    exceed 100 characters per URL
24.    bury site files deeper than two directory levels

I see sites every day that make the mistakes above.   While the majority of the mistakes, are just mistakes, some of them are truly negligent.  Even if your web developer isn’t trying to harm your rankings intentionally, it’s still SEO malpractice.  Stay tuned to discover more things to avoid so that your site doesn’t get penalized by Google’s strict rules.

To your online success…

Chadd Bryant

Just a quick little tip today.  This one is quite funny.  Did you know that you may have words on your site that may be harming your position on Google?  You may have a site that’s completely clean, but Google sees your content and thinks you’re trying to trick the search engines.

Here’s what I mean.  You have to look at your content with a “dirty mind.”  Read through it and see if other people would take it to mean something else.  Are there words in there that have double meanings?  That’s the biggest mistake people make when writing their content.  If you have anything that sounds dirty, you can be banned from “clean searches.”

Here’s a funny example.  A site for preschoolers may say “Kids l0ve ju1ce and cookies.”  That looks pretty clean.  How could that possible be turned into something dirty.  Look again.  You see, the proximity of the words makes the difference.  See where it says, “l0ve ju1ce.”  Now use your imagination and you can figure out what kinds of sites might be putting something like that on their sites.  Also, note that I didn’t type those words out using letters.  I substituted in a few numbers so that Google doesn’t think I’m talking about fowl things in this blog.  That would be pretty stupid, wouldn’t it?

So if your site contains innocent things like the phrase “Kids l0ve ju1c and cookies” you could be penalized in Google’s search results.  If you’re webmaster wrote your copy but neglected to scan the copy for potential things that could harm your rankings, that’s SEO malpractice.

Until later…

Chadd Bryant

Yesterday, we started talking a little about SEO Malpractice and the use of “Black Hat” techniques.  So today we’re going to begin getting into what some of the most common techniques are.  If you’re just tuning in, please note that these techniques are bad.  I’m not condoning them.  I’m simply hoping to educate you so that you know them when you see them and you can steer clear of any company that’s offering them to you.

So first off, let me give you a quick background.  It’s important that you understand why Google has had to clamp down and de-list sites for cheating their way into the rankings.  Google’s mission, as stated on their site, is “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.”  That includes providing relevant results when you search for something.  I remember when Google first came onto the scene, you’d be searching for recipes for dinner and you may wind up with the first 5 listings containing porn.  It was very disturbing for those of us who are trying to keep our nose clean.

The porn sites hoped that the temptation would be so great that you’d click on the links when they were presented to you, despite the fact that you were looking for recipes.  They were right.  Sex is a very powerful thing and the porn industry grew faster than ever.  However, Google and their users eventually became upset because the porn was quite distracting.  After all, how could people get anything done, not to mention that it was a horrible thing for children.

Google had to figure out why the porn sites were coming up in the search results when people searched for just about anything and how to stop it.  You see, the porn industry webmasters had figured out that all you had to do was make a page that talked about recipes and then put porn it.  But that looked a little funny to have porn next to a recipe for fried chicken so they discovered that you could hide the stuff that you didn’t want the viewer to see.  That way Google would see it, and be tricked into thinking that it was a page about fried chicken.

The most commonly used technique, early on, was to hide text.  Just put white text on a white background and it was invisible to the reader.  Google didn’t know that the text was unreadable because their computers were just reading the code and were not physically looking at the site.  Google caught on to that one and began comparing the text color to the background color to make sure that there was sufficient contrast.  That stopped the porn industry for about 5 minutes until they figured out the next sneaky trick to cheat their way into the listings.

Eventually, Google was forced to strip the power from the webmaster almost completely and give the power to the public to determine which sites were listed at the top.  Linking became the primary means for ranking sites and still is the most important criteria.

It’s basically like a popularity contest.  The site that has the most, or best sites linking to them wins.  I like to think of it like a high school party.  Which would be considered a better party, the one where the cheer leaders and the football team showed up, or the one where the math club and the debate team showed up?  You could have a party with 30 of the most popular people show up and it would be talked about all year, and the math club party with 50 people wouldn’t go down in history as one of the greatest parties ever.  The same is true with the linking game.  You have to get people to link to your site who also have popular sites.  Getting 50 links from unpopular sites won’t do much for your site’s status.  You’re actually better off getting fewer links from better sites than you are getting links from lots of unpopular, no-name sites.

But back to how to avoid SEO Malpractice…

I know that seemed like a long divergence from the topic, but here’s my point, Google is now looking at the sites that you’re link with and determining if they are worthy sites and letting that control your position in their ranking.  If you trade links with sites that have a bad reputation then your site is likely to be penalized.  It’s called linking to bad neighborhoods.  Stay clear of anything that appears to be malicious, dangerous, obscene or otherwise bad.  You can’t help it if they choose to link to you, but NEVER EVER link to them.  That can get your site banned too.

Tomorrow, we’ll talk a little more about linking and then about something that can be perceived as completely harmless, but can hurt your rankings seriously.

Until then…

It seems that more and more people are becoming the victim of SEO Malpractice.  What is that?  It’s when you hire a web developer or SEO company who untimately harms your position on Google.  There are techniques that Google openly discloses as “black hat” techniques.  These techniques, while they may help to rapidly shoot your site to the top of the major search engines, can potentially cause your site to be delisted from Google.  That means that they’ll totally remove your site from their database and your site’s traffic will plummet.

So, over the coming weeks, we’ll be discussing some of the techniques that are used by the “cheaters” and how to avoid becoming a victim yourself.

Until tomorrow…

SEO malpractice is everywhere.  Since more than 96% of all web sites have never even been read by anyone other than the owner of the site, millions, if not billions of dollars are wasted every single year on web design and development.  That same money might as well be flushed down the toilet.  With the rapidly growing number of so-called website design experts, amateurs-turned-expert are everywhere.  Perhaps it’s the ease of entry into the field.  Pick up a book or two on Amazon and you may think you know all you need to know.  Unfortunately, that’s how most web developers got their start.  While web development doesn’t require an 8-year academic degree from Harvard, it does require lot and experience to do it right.  And all of you who have paid for websites that have failed to perform, you have been the guinea pigs for the web masters in training.  Essentially, you paid them to learn how to do it.  That’s so backwards.  The web masters should have been paying for their education but instead, they were paid by you to get their education.  And the real cost to you was probably far greater than just the money you paid the novice web master.  When you stop to consider the years of lost business and the loss of market share and the cost of regaining market share it’s a staggering number.  If 5 years ago your competitor found a competent designer and you wound up with a novice, your competition has likely been growing each year while your online sales have been flat.   They now have a 5-year jump on you in SEO, not to mention a larger loyal customer base.

So you may have saved a couple hundred or even a few thousand dollars by using the cheap guy, but what did it cost you in the long run?  Now you’re gun shy, and rightfully so.  You’re afraid to hire another guy to fix it or even re-do the whole site because it’s hard to know if Mr. New Web Guy knows his stuff or not.  After all, you trusted the last guy and thought that he sounded like he knew his stuff.  He sure knew a lot more than you did so you fell for it.

As the adage goes, “Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me twice, shame on me.”  You’re not about to let that happen again.  But considering that 96% of websites pretty much suck, how can you find the small number of web developers who know their stuff?

Over the next few days and weeks, we’ll be developing a series of blog posts designed to help you avoid SEO malpractice, so you can find the right developers who know their stuff.  So stay tuned.  I hop you enjoy.

Chadd Bryant

When the IBCC first gathered to consider the question of the fundamental elements that have to be included in a website in order for it to be a successful site, we started the discussion with things like “a seamless shopping cart.”  But a lot of sites are very successful even without a shopping cart.  There are no hard and fast rules that say that you have to sell something through your site in order for it to be successful.  So perhaps the better question to ask is, “How do you define a successful site?”

That’s a question that leads to many answers.  For some, the site just conveys a message.  Take a political website.  Their main goal is to get people to vote for their issue.  Other sites may sell advertising so their goal is to get as much traffic through their site as possible.  Other sites may sell products and need to have a sales process that leads the customer through a shopping cart, ultimately ending in a transaction.  Other sites may be interested in generating leads.  B2B operations are often more concerned with generating leads, educating them and building a relationship, rather than selling them a product right now.

So back to the question of what makes a successful site…

Once you realize that success can be determined in many ways, the answer you’re looking for must be one that’s broad and covers all types of goals.  So the IBCC determined that in order to meet the needs of most any type of site, the three keys to online success are as follows:

1. Get people to the site
2. Get them to stay at the site
3. Get them to come back again and again

Accomplish these three simple tasks and virtually any site will be successful, no matter what the ultimate goal is.  The 3-step formula works for e-commerce, education, B2B and more.  You name it.

I know, there are people out there that love to play the Devil’s advocate and they’re saying, “But if you sell someone your product on the first visit, then they don’t need to come back.”  Or maybe some of you are thinking, “If they click on an ad on the site right away, then they don’t need to stay at the site.”  True, but think of the difference in the level of success if you accomplish all three goals as opposed to just one or two.

If you sell someone your product on the first visit and they never come back, didn’t you lose out on future money?  Studies have shown that the life time value of a customer is far greater than the first transaction.  Get them to come back again and sell them more and more and more.  That’s the key to online success when operating an e-commerce site.  Or get them to come back again and again to click on your ads, if you’re just selling advertising.

Until next time.

Chadd Bryant