• Let’s Take A Look At A New Keyword Phrase  •
• Are My Search Engine Optimization Techniques Effective? •

In my continuing promise to ”put my money where my mouth is”, and openly share some of the keyword phrases that I actually use and rank highly for on my own sites, I thought I’d show you a keyword phrase that is bringing a nice trickle of traffic to my blog every day: google search cheats.

As of today’s date (May 29, 2008) I am pleased to say that my SEO efforts have paid off very nicely and I have a top ranking position of #4 out of 389,000 SERPs.

How Did I Achieve This Top-Ten Ranking?

Obviously, I have used the keyword phrase google search cheats and a slight variation of it properly in the Title tag:
     <title>Google Search Cheats | Advanced Google Search Techniques</title>

Also, the description that I wrote and inserted into the “All In One SEO Pack” plugin that I do make use of for my blog posts, was also used by Google in the returned result:
     <meta name=“description” content=”Utilize Google’s search capabilities to its fullest. Refine your Google searches. Searching tips, techniques and cheats for internet marketers.” />

I will admit that I was focusing on the very competitive keyword phrase “google search” which quite honestly I knew I’d not rank well for at all at this stage of my blog’s age and number of posts, but still decided to stick with that as the main phrase, but use the modifiers of “google search cheats” and “google search techniques”.

Sometimes it is just fun to take a gamble and see what happens with ranking positions. it is my own blog, after all, not a client’s site that I am taking chances with. In addition, I like to do experiments with the way I write my tags and the manner in which I utilize keywords when I optimize. I continue to learn and expand my SEO abilities in this way.

If you notice, I didn’t use the combined keyword phrase google search cheats towards the beginning of the description as I would usually do (and teach my clients to do, too) had this been the primary keyword phrase.

But! As can so often can be proven in search engine optimization efforts, NOTHING is set in cement as far as there being a “one right way” to optimize tags. And look what happened! With everything being taken into consideration by the happy little Google spiders, I am ranking #4. Obviously between the way the competition has optimized for the term versus the way I ended up optimizing for the term … Google thinks I did a great job and rewarded me appropriately.

I have also used the keyword phrase effectively in the post’s content.  Don’t forget that it just isn’t Title tags and meta tags that come into ranking consideration by the search engines. 

As can also happen in one’s SEO efforts, tweaking things every now and then can be a good thing. I see that I chose to name the permalink “seo-google-search-help”. You know what? I’m going to cash in on the fact that “google search cheats” is bringing me some nice traffic, and to help keep the ranking where it is, I’m going to tweak the permalink and change “help” to “cheat”. Why not?

Does this example help you? I hope so. You know, it’s sometimes hard to try and convey the subtleties of how to perform effective SEO techniques. Remember that analysis is necessary when it comes to SEO, and sometimes your efforts pay off in slightly different directions than what you originally had in mind.

• SEO Rankings Can Go Up … And They Can Go Down •
• There Is Usually One Of Three Basic Issues Affecting A Rankings Change •

I have been writing about how I am able to maintain top SEO rankings for the keyword phrase garden art project: read about it here.

At the time of that article (March 25, 2008), I held the #1 and #2 Google SERP positions. Today, I see I have the #2 and #3 positions, and also that the total number of SERPs (search engine result pages) that Google is showing has dropped significantly from 2.4 million to about 1.2 million.

Here is a screenshot I took a moment ago:

See what can happen in just a few weeks with rankings and other search engine results? The number of competing pages dropped significantly and I would have thought I’d have stayed up at the top with my ranking positions, but I haven’t.

But you know what? I’m not alarmed, nor really concerned, as little fluctuations can happen from time to time.  I will just sit back for now and see what happens within another week or two. If this competing website is still at #1, then I will make a decision as to what I need to do to try and attain the top spots again.

Trust me, I am not boo-hooing, as #2 and #3 are still WONDERFUL Google rankings to have.

Why Do Keyword Phrase Rankings Fluctuate?

You can pretty well bet there is more than one reason why my rankings, or yours, or anybody else’s may take a small nose dive, a huge drop, or on the positive side, a rise in the rankings from week to week, or month to month. Some of us refer to it as “The Rankings Roller Coaster”.

There is one thing you can be sure of, and that is this: NOTHING  is for sure in the search engine rankings wars! LOL  Just as in life, the ONLY thing for sure is that things are in a constant state of change. And this applies to Google, Yahoo!, MSN and all the other search engines as well.

The Three Main Reasons For SEO Ranking Fluctuations

The three basic reasons for drops or rises are either you’ve changed your site in some manner; competitors’ sites have changed; or the search engines’ algorithms changed. Be aware fluctuations can be one or a combination of these three.

To give you a little more insight, here’s a few more things to think about:

On-site issues :  Page content, products, file names, even the actual coding of your website might change every now and then, on down to daily or even hourly changes. (It all depends upon how you maintain your site.)  Anything can cause a slight or even drastic fluctuation in the rankings.

However, all being kept about the same as far as what you normally maintain and “do” on your site, there shouldn’t be anything to worry about if you dip down a notch or two.

But, if you’ve caused a coding error, or caused a glitch somewhere on your site, you might experience bigger search engine ranking problems.

Back-links (in-pointing) links :  There can be a change or drop in some good quality links that point to your website from other well-ranking websites. This is something we usually haven’t too much control over. This is also something that will happen to even the best of sites.

Hopefully you’ve not fallen prey to buying “link building” software or hiring companies that promise to get you high rankings by purchasing in-pointing links. Normally these are junk links and though you may see a spike in your rankings, it’s a short lived situation. You can also hurt your rankings by going after links from websites that are in non-related niches, or in “spam niches”, and the like.

Just keep pursuing good quality, links from relevant sites to help counteract the times when you do lose a back-link.

Server down time :  Sometimes SEO ranking drops may be due to nothing more than your website being inaccessible when the search engines try to spider your content. Usually a single instance of inaccessibility won’t affect your rankings. But, if your site is down repeatedly during crawl times … you have a serious issue that needs fixing quick!

Remember: If the search engine bots cannot spider your site when they show up at your front door, then they’ve got nothing to analyze for your ranking positions. The solution to this possibility is to have a good reliable web host provider.

A change in search algorithms :  This is one area that you and I have absolutely NO control over. Google, Yahoo!, MSN and the other SE’s have these very smart analytical-type employees sitting in their offices figuring out complicated mathematical formulas that instruct the search engines on how to process the terms you and I are searching for in relation to the gazillions of web pages filled with another gazillion subjects.  Whew … that was a mouth full!

In other words, it’s a well guarded secret as to exactly what factors are taken into consideration to deliver you or me good ranking positions. Don’t get me wrong … yes we can get a pretty good idea of what causes “good” rankings versus crummy or non-existent rankings, but the absolute answers are locked up somewhere in the search engine vaults! :) 

Suffice it to say it is true that the better the content and more theme oriented your website is, the better you will do in the rankings. And the better you’ve succeeded with your SEO optimization efforts, the better you will probably do in the rankings, too.

And then there is your competition :  If we could get rid of the competition, we’d all be in great shape! But seriously folks, new sites come onto the scene; other sites add new pages of quality content; maybe other sites gain a few more quality in-pointing links than you have; maybe a competitor starts paying better attention to their search engine optimization efforts than you are; maybe someone just wrote a couple of new articles using a keyword you didn’t have much competition for previously … the list goes on and on.

Do you get the idea of all the variables that can come into play when it comes to a drop (or rise) in search engine rankings?

I will be touching upon more of these issues in greater depth in future posts. But for now, I do hope you’ve gained some insight into the reasons for “the SEO rankings roller coaster” effect.

• Let’s Take Another Look At My Keyword Rankings •
• Is Search Engine Optimization Working? •

Time flies by and I realized I need to write an update to my rankings. In an effort to honestly show you that ethical SEO techniques really do make a difference, I have promised to actually expose one of my websites and some of the keywords that are responsible for bringing me quality targeted traffic.

So, in the last post of March 26th I was holding down the #1 and #2 positions for the keyword phrase: hypertufa recipes

Good News! One month has gone by and I am still  holding those same top spots.

But I have mentioned before that you can’t sit back after finally attaining top search engine positions, expecting your web pages to remain at the top. No siree! Depending upon the niche you are in, you may find your rankings slipping over time, due to the competition (and other factors as well).

Even if you experience a long stretch of stable top rankings, I still suggest you write a new new page of content every now and then to help add value for your site’s visitors and to help reinforce your ranking position(s). 

To that end, I DO practice what I preach, and I wrote another good solid page of information the other day, utilizing this keyword phrase. I don’t want to get nudged out of my great ranking positions by those other people down below me.

Hey … have you signed up yet for my bi-weekly SEO newsletter?  Learn how to implement ethical SEO techniques on your website or blog! If you’ve not yet done so, click here and you’ll be taken right to the sign-up page!  Plus, you’ll get a FREE copy of my informative eBook “The SEO Edge”.

Not a bad deal if I say so myself!