Tuesday 30 January 2007

So Why Do I Need Search Engine Optimisation For My Website?

So, if you've read the last post, about the relationship between search engines and websites, we're guessing you now want to know more.

Read on if you want to know why you need search engine optimisation for your business' website, and even if you don't want to know - we suggest you read anyway! The below is taken from an SEO brochure that we give out, please Contact Us if you'd like a hard copy.

1) The Internet, Search Engines and Your Business

An estimated 37.6 million people from the UK are online 1 , over 1 billion the world over - so whether your business is local to Lincoln and Lincolnshire, is regional, national or international, someone somewhere is looking for what you do.

Approximiately 80% of the above internet traffic goes through the search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN etc) - so to be cost effective you need to put your efforts into ranking highly with these top search engines first!

2) How Tippabush Can Change Your Rankings

A recent report 2 revealed that a staggering 62% of search engine users click on a website on the first page of results, and 90% within the first 3 pages.

Therefore, you MUST be on the first page for your main keywords, and within the first three pages for your secondary keywords.

SEO - The Truth
Don't be fooled by exaggerated claims GUARANTEEING to get your company to the top of the rankings. If the offer seems to good to be true then it probably is.

Our Promise To You
We GUARANTEE to try our best to get you on page 1 of the big three search engines (UK Search Engine Share - Google 74.67%, Yahoo 9.3%, MSN 5.46% - Feb 2006 Source: Web Side Story).
We GUARANTEE to use only legitimate SEO techniques, that will bring short AND long-term results.
We GUARANTEE to be always "upto speed" on the SEO industry.

3) Our SEO Services

Basic Package

An affordable solution for smaller businesses, ideal for new businesses on a limited budget, or where competition for keywords is less intense.

The service includes:

  • keyword research and analysis;
  • keyword placement and content optimisation;
  • keyword density checks;
  • internal link development;
  • sitemap creation;
  • management of a Google Webmaster Tools account;
  • a monthly rankings report;
  • and an optimised link from our own website.

Advanced Package

For the best chance of first page rankings in competitive markets, having related quality links pointing to your site is essential. To give your website a boost, this package is the ideal cost-effective solution.

The service includes -

  • all of the basic package above plus;
  • creation and development of an external linking and link management campaign;

PLEASE NOTE: WE DO NOT USE AUTOMATED LINK EXCHANGING SOFTWARE. WE ENSURE QUALITY BY DOING EVERYTHING MANUALLY.

If you are not sure which package is right for your business, we can help. For a small fee (refundable when you have an SEO package from Tippabush 3) we will do some initial keyword research and a competitive study before giving you our recommendations.

4) Do We Know What We're Doing?

Try this search on Google "search engine optimisation lincolnshire", and see which company is #1 (at time of writing this post). Yep, it's Tippabush! 1st out of approx. 71,000 pages.

5) Contact Us For A Quote!

Email info@tippabush.co.uk, or call Paul on 07877 800538.

Footnotes:
1 - statistics provided by InternetWorldStats.com (18 Sept 2006)
2 - report by iProspect.com dated 11 Apr 2006 -
view press release here
3 - both SEO packages consist of an upfront payment for the intial work followed by ongoing monthly fees for reporting and follow-up work

Friday 12 January 2007

Websites and Search Engines: What's The Deal?

Our first post of 2007 is going to concentrate on dispelling a certain myth that seems to crop up time and time again amongst people wanting new websites...the relationship between a new website, and the search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN, AOLSearch etc).

THE 1ST RULE IS: HAVING A WEBSITE DOES NOT MEAN IT WILL AUTOMATICALLY TURN UP AT OR NEAR THE TOP OF GOOGLE'S SEARCH RESULTS FOR WHATEVER KEYWORDS YOU TYPE IN (or any other search engine for that matter).

Let's back peddle a bit first for some background information on how search engines work. We'll only cover this briefly here - it's well worthy of an entire post of it's own sometime.

A search engine is basically a massive database of web pages and other documents available online. It finds these pages by using small automated programs called "robots" or "spiders". We'll use the latter. These spiders constantly crawl through the web (hence their name) following links from one web page to another, and report all the information they find back to the search engine. An algorithm with hundreds of influencing factors then decides what subject the web page is, how important the web page is within it's own website and it's industry etc, and cross-references this with all of the text content on the webpage.

Once this has happened, the web page is now indexed by the search engine, meaning that it is POSSIBLE for someone to come across it in a search, but is only likely to if they type in your company name. Once indexed, this becomes a continuous process, with the spider re-visiting your website to get new information and new content (if any) once in a while. How often depends on how important it feels your site is.

So, given the above process takes time, the first thing you should learn is that YOUR WEBSITE WILL NOT APPEAR IN THE SEARCH RESULTS THE SECOND AFTER IT HAS BEEN LAUNCHED. The most we've known it to take (with Google anyway) is 6 weeks, if you have a website designed and built by Tippabush it takes on average about 2 weeks to get indexed. This is because we always put a screenshot, description and link of each finished project on the portfolio page of our website - and because our own website is considered fairly important, the spider visits us quite often.

THE 2ND RULE IS: HAVING A WEBSITE DOES NOT MEAN IT WILL AUTOMATICALLY TURN UP AT OR NEAR THE TOP OF GOOGLE'S SEARCH RESULTS FOR WHATEVER KEYWORDS YOU TYPE IN (or any other search engine for that matter).

"So how do I get my website up or near the top of the search results?" I hear you cry. The answer is simple, the work involved is not - as well as having a website built, you need to have a service applied to it called... SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMISATION (or SEO for short).

The good news is... Tippabush can offer you this service. It can be carried out on existing websites as well as new ones (we offer a 10% discount on the overall price if a new website order is complemented with an SEO order). Contact Us Now!

The bad news is... There is a lot of time-consuming work involved, especially with our fully comprehensive service. Whilst time costs as with all business, you'll be pleased to know that with every SEO quote, Tippabush provide a 3-page document explaining EXACTLY what we do for your money - which it must be said, many other "SEO firms" do not.

The next post on this blog will address WHY you need SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMISATION applying to your website, but if you can't wait to find out more, head over to our website and read the SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMISATION FIRMS UK page to learn more.

Alternatively, you can Contact Us Now and we can send you a FREE SEO LEAFLET.

THE 3RD RULE IS: HAVING A WEBSITE DOES NOT MEAN IT WILL AUTOMATICALLY TURN UP AT OR NEAR THE TOP OF GOOGLE'S SEARCH RESULTS FOR WHATEVER KEYWORDS YOU TYPE IN (or any other search engine for that matter).

Ok, we're sure you're getting the picture now...