Guide To Choosing SEO Keywords | SEO Traffic Spider

Author: Seo Traffic Spider

Search Engine Optimization is vital for any business that decides to make its presence felt in the market through the Internet. However, when venturing out into the SEO world, it is important to choose the right SEO keywords and optimize them. Mining for the right SEO keywords may take a considerable amount of your time and effort, but the fruits of it will be rewarding.

First, it is important to understand the importance of keyword selection and how to use your keywords on your website in order to enhance your marketing strategy.

Keyword research is one of the most basic steps in a good search engine optimization design and without it all SEO efforts will be wasted. Also, it is important to perform a thorough keyword research before you start placing keywords on your webpage.

SEO Keyword Research
Keyword Research is the process of identifying a list of keywords and then selecting those keywords that accurately reflect your products and services. It involves finding out which are the most popular terms searched by Internet users, how widely they are searched and how many and which other websites run on those keywords.

It is also important to think in terms of how your target audience would search for products or services on the Internet. For instance, if you have a website promoting a golf club, then it would not make much sense for you to target keywords like “golf” or “golfing” because these keywords are extremely general and have tons of competitors. Also, since you are targeting only people who are looking out for a golf club, using a general keyword like “golf” will bring in a lot of irrelevant traffic. This is because visitors may be looking for anything related to golf, such as golf history, golf tips, golf news, and so on. Typically a person who is looking out for a golf club will type in “golf club” and related terms instead of the single term “golf.” So from this example it is evident that the best choice of keywords for you would be to use phrases like “golf club” instead of single and general keywords.

You can use keyword research tools (free and paid) that are available online in order to see what users are searching for. There are several such tools which contain data on search queries performed by users over a period of time. These tools will help you get an idea on the kind of terms that are searched for and also their frequency of search. Any keyword research tool will let you enter a word and show results on similar terms including variations, synonyms, misspellings, singulars, and plurals. Not only do these tools provide information on search volume but also show data on the advertiser competition for keywords.

Once keyword research is done and you have built your keyword list, these keywords can then be placed at appropriate places in your webpage content to achieve a high ranking in search engines. However, avoid placing too many on the same page as search engines consider this practice as keyword stuffing and may penalize your site for it.

SEO Keyword Tactics
Keyword Research will help you get the most popular, lucrative, and top SEO keywords which may be searched by thousands of users in a day. However, if there are several competitors for the keywords you have chosen, then it will be very difficult to beat those sites and get the top ranking in the search results. Conversely, if you choose keywords that are very specific or niche that no one searches on them, then top ranking for your site is wasted as there would be none to see it. The idea behind choosing the right SEO keywords is that they should help you achieve top ranking with reasonable efforts and budget. If your site fails to show on the first or second page of the search results then it would really not be worth the time and effort that would have gone in optimizing those keywords.

You will most often find that the best SEO keywords are already being used by a large number of competitors and these high volume keywords may be very tempting to use but may not always fetch you the ranking you desire. Therefore, the catch here is to fish out those keywords that have strong relevance to your website, high search volume, and relatively less competition because these keywords will be more rewarding than just high volume competitive keywords. It is quite possible to achieve a good search engine ranking while staying within your budget and with minimal effort using low volume less competitive SEO keywords when compared to high volume ones. To do this, you need to find out how tough it is to get a good ranking for a specific keyword and this can be done using keyword difficulty tools.

About the Author:

SEO Traffic Spider, is a global provider offering its customers a full suite of SEO solutions ranging from Indexing, Optimization - On Page/Off Page, Linking, SEO Copywriting, Site Overhauling, Traffic Analytics, etc.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Guide To Choosing SEO Keywords | SEO Traffic Spider

SEO Keyword Tool - Search Engine Keyword Database

Author: Ricky Lim

Most new webmasters think that by building a website, they will get traffic automatically. Unfortunately, that is not true online. The saying “build it and they will come” does not hold true in the online world.

One of the ways to get targeted traffic is to position your website high in the search engines for the keyword you are targeting. It is called SEO or search engine optimization.

Although there are many SEO companies that can help you do this, it would be best to learn how to do it yourself first. Most people tend to make SEO more complicated than it really is and they are many SEO myths and legends around if you browse some of the more popular SEO forums.

The first step in SEO is to determine the base keyword of your website and then get a SEO keyword tool. There are many such tools available online. Some are desktop tools while others are online services. Most require a payment or monthly subscription fee however, there are a few good SEO keyword tools that are free.

One such tool is the Google keyword tool. This tool is provided for adwords advertisers but it can still be used for SEO purposes. Simply enter the keyword and google will show you the monthly search volume as well as the related keyword phrases.

You can also see the cost per price for that keyword as well as google trends for their keyword. You can use this tool to give you ideas for hundred of other keyword phrases that people are searching for which are related to your website.

The only disadvantage of the Google keyword tool is that it does not tell you how competitive that keyword is.

Another SEO keyword tool that does that is wordtracker. Wordtracker is quite a popular keyword search tool that has over 40 million keywords in its database. It is similar to Google keyword tool except it does tell you know how competitive a keyword is, however their keyword database does not come from google but from meta search engines such as metacrawler.

While they are some arguments about the accuracy of their database since almost no one today uses meta search engines, it is in my opinion still a good point of reference.

About the Author:

If you are looking for the best keyword service database, check out my Jim Morris Nichebot 2 review.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - SEO Keyword Tool - Search Engine Keyword Database

SEO MISTAKES TO AVOID

Author: Wealth Maker

What is SEO? SEO is Search Engine Optimization. Google, Yahoo and Bing [formerly MSN] crawl through content of your article, blog, website, etc., and look for valuable and relevant content. SEO is what gets you in the top 10 positions on the left side of the page when it is opened up. It is referred to as generic listings. On the right side of the page you will see little boxes or ads, and those are what is considered PPC [Pay Per Click]. Every time you click on those, the advertiser pays Google, Yahoo or Bing (depending what search engine you are using).

The crawlers that are looking for good content go from left to right, so it is important that your title and article have keywords that these crawlers can pick up and are relevant to your article/blog/site.

There are basically 5 mistakes that most people make when they are trying to optimize for SEO content.

Mistake #1: Keyword Stuffing. This is the overuse of keywords that identify the content of your website, blog, article, etc. If you "stuff" too many keywords into your title and/or your headline, and/or article, the crawlers will reject it. "Stuffing" is just as bad as not having any keywords. Either way will not get your article ranked. The bottom line -- too many keywords in your title will not give you the results that you want.

Mistake #2: Missing Keywords. Totally leaving out keywords, or not having relevant keywords will not get you ranked either. The first two words of the Title need to have or be part of the keywords -- Google reads from left to right when searching for content. Why is ranking so important? If you don't get ranked, your website, blog, article will not get found. If you can't be found, all your work and time and effort you put into it will be in vain. All your content is out there somewhere , floating in cyber space!! You can search the relevancy of the keywords that you want to use by going to Free Keyword Suggestion Tool from Wordtracker, or by using Google Keyword Tool, both of which are free. Remember, without the proper keywords on your title/headline, the chances of you getting ranked high enough for people to find your website is slim to none.

Mistake #3: Missing Description. By always using descriptions on your blog posts allows for better rankings and click through. Be brief, but descriptive. Remember -- people scan quickly! If they can't find what they are looking for, in 2 seconds they are gone! Whether it is in your title or in the content, descriptions are key on having people find what they are looking for. For example, if your website is for a restaurant, you want pictures, a menu and maybe even some recipes for favorite dishes. CAPITALIZATION isn't not good for descriptions, especially in titles. Your description needs to be relevant.

Mistake #4: Simple Anchor Texts. You can have the best written article in the world, and if you don't have anchor texts that backlink to your website, then the article is not doing what you want it to do -- have people come to your site and buy whatever it is you are selling. This is probably the most common overlooked mistake. For example, if you are having people go to your landing page, and you simply have a click through or backlink that says "Click Here", it really isn't compelling. However, if it says something like "I Want Paul's Growing Formula To Success", it is more compelling and appealing for people to click through. Also, always make sure that you add backlinks to others websites or your websites.

Mistake #5: Title Tags. The title of your page or post that you want to rank is the single most important factor when it comes to on-page optimization. Take some time and put some thought into your title and keywords. For example, the title of this post is SEO Mistakes to Avoid. The first two words rank high in keywords that are being searched, in fact the whole title ranks high.

So now you know! When first starting out, keep your title and keywords simple, and check them to see how competitive they are. As time goes on, and you get more skilled, go for those competitive keywords.

To your success!

About the Author:

As a real estate investor, father of 3 adult prosperous and wonderful children, and business owner, I’ve always been an entrepreneur at heart, and have successfully started and sold several businesses over the years. I have even started some businesses that have failed; so I know both ends of the spectrum!

I have tried several different MLM companies, and was able to build a good organization with them, but it seemed that the leaders always left for some other ‘newest and latest’ business opportunity. In one case, our up line even kept the money that was supposed to pass on down to us!!

Even when I had a brick and mortar business, I was always looking for ways to build a business online; something that would give me a residual income. I have tried several affiliate programs that promised me thousands of dollars if I would just promote their product. Little did I know that the thousands of dollars would be coming from my pocket…instead of how I had envisioned it – going into my pocket!!

I am the kind of guy you really do want to get to know and learn from!! Click on the link below to learn more about me http://squidoo.com/paul-eugene-miller

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - SEO MISTAKES TO AVOID

seo

Basic SEO Rules For Beginners

Author: Joyce Jackson

Search engine optimization for your website is pretty straight forward, but it can seem complicated. Basically, the point of SEO is to make everything simpler and cleaner. This is the way search engines like it. And, if you use the "KISS" principle, "keep it simple, stupid", even a beginner can optimize a website well.

Everything a search engine does has a pattern and a reason. Even if the algorithms are too complex for you to understand, there are patterns that can be found. There are many sites online that offer tips and help with finding and explaining these patterns.

Good SEO requires work and effort. It is, for the most part, very basic. To have a successful website campaign, follow these simple rules:

1. Bad Sites Get Pushed To The Bottom
Search engines always try to give users whatever they can find that is relevant to their search. You have to realize that most search engines don't work by moving the good stuff towards the top: instead, they try to push the bad stuff towards the bottom, and hope that what's good will "float to the top."

2. Content Is King
Content is king and it can get you good search engine rankings easily if it's written properly and sprinkled with the appropriate keywords. This not only brings visitors to your site but also feeds search engine spiders and crawlers.

A fast way to develop good content is to generate a series of articles or an ebook regarding your topic. These items are very powerful in the world of SEO because they provide your visitors with something to read and they allow you to conquer some keywords that you normally wouldn't be able to touch. If you are managing a website for pets, an article about dog food is more likely to generate a high position in the search results for "dog food" than your home page. Therefore, if you write articles pertaining to your subject but slightly more in depth than you can put on your home page, you will benefit drastically.

3. Check Your Position
To try to get to number one in an index, you must first find out where your site is now. That means checking each search engine to see your position, and coming up with a strategy for each one - who knows, maybe you're already number one on one of the smaller search engines! You can't just assume, however, that because your site is listed in one search engine that it will be listed in all of them. That's not how search engines work.

4. Simplicity Is Best
Look at the sites that currently rank high on the search engines and you will see that have simple designs with graphics that use minimal bandwidth, and they're easy to navigate. Simple, clean designs are what both search engine crawlers and search engine users like, as it lets them get the content they want without any fuss. This is what you should be aiming for.

5. Optimiaze Tags And Keywords
Let's take a look at meta tags, keywords, descriptions, and titles. They're all important
elements, even if they're not what will make or break your site - they're just one part of your strategy. These elements need to be compelling and sprinkled with your keywords, as this will entice users to click through from the search results page to your website. It's best to start off slowly, gradually adding things in as you learn.

If you have any questions and you don't know where to go, then check out some of the forums on the subject. A simple search for "seo forum" will give great results. Remember, be patient. Learning SEO or search engine optimization takes time and effort but pays off in the end.

About the Author:
Joyce Jackson is an SEO consultant and webmaster. For more information see Net Home Profits.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Basic SEO Rules For Beginners

3 Key Objectives Of SEO Articles

Article By: Bay Cities Marketing


The following is a list of the three major objectives you want to achieve when you write and publish an article on SEO. They will go a long way to generating traffic.

Content

Your objective is to try and get readers to remain on your website and actually take in some of the information you provide. Believe it or not, Google tracks the amount of time visitors actually spend at your site. Im sure they dont do it for fun. It has a role in determining your search engine ranking.
Visitors to your site are much savvier than you might think. They are visiting your website to obtain information on a particular topic and will recognize frivolous, non-relevant and poorly written content right off the bat and they wont hang around very long.

Remember that in most cases, readers are sitting at their computer with your website content in front of them. They need a reason to continue looking at it and absorbing the information you are providing.
You need to grab their attention. Super information will do that. You may also tell a story or make a humorous comment. If you can convert your reader into an interested party you have much better chance of converting him or her to a sale.

Before you publish your article, step back for awhile and then re-read it. Proof reading is one of the most common omissions made by article marketers. Things like grammar and punctuation are important features of a well written and well read article.

Keywords
Using keywords in your article is always a tricky thing to do. You can actually use keywords too often and is often considered "stuffing" by Google when it crawls your site and will have a negative effect on your search engine ranking. You should try and place your keywords within your article without making them stand out in an awkward style. Proper placement of keywords should allow your article to flow in a readable fashion that readers can understand. Experienced internet marketers will catch the misuse of keywords right away. And they will leave your site.

Even the very best article will be of no benefit to you if nobody sees it. Keywords are intended to allow search engines to index the type of article that match a searchers query. If possible try to find and use keywords that are well searched but with less competition than more common ones.

Call To Action
By far the most missed item in any article is what is referred in sales as a "call to action". It is a fact that many people fail at sales because they simply dont ask for the sale!

In an article, it is vital to capture the readers attention early in the article and gradually build up to what must be a request for your reader to make a decision. Avoid catchy phrases, over-hype, and loud graphics that actually turn people off rather than excite them. In an ideal situation your article will have the effect of making your reader want to take action. In which case you simply lead them along to what they need to do next.

Summary

Always be mindful of how you write your article. It must be more than just a compilation of keywords around sentences. Your article, particularly an SEO article, can be very beneficial to you. Finally, when you bring readers to your site you want to grab their attention and encourage them to take action. This can be done effectively with a well written article.

Article source: http://affiliatemarketing.myfreearticlecentral.com/Article_42252_3-Key-Objectives-Of-SEO-Articles.aspx

SEO as a Business Strategy

The World Wide Web has grown with participants ranging from grandpas to gamers to major CEOs logging in on a daily basis to find information of their own particular interest. Using the Internet as a promotional platform has become increasingly difficult. In the beginning there were few sites that offered content, the bulk of which were maintained by a very small community. With the advent of the Internet becoming increasingly understood by the masses, the ability to post and promote information has become easy while successful implementation of marketing initiatives is, in a word, difficult. The current paradigms of online-oriented business strategies are changing back to the original idea behind the Internet: INFORMATION.

Historical Truth is the New Perspective

Every business seeking success in the current global market must maintain some kind of active online business strategy. The types of businesses that use these strategies are not limited to hi-tech, but extend into other areas of interest like genealogy or vintage clothing. A simple search of any particular niche will turn up well over 10,000 hits. Every industry can benefit from Internet-based strategies.

Certain business truths have guided our way of working in the past and continue to do so now. To get customers, the customer has to know where to find your front door. This front door in global business is your home page, getting customers in that door requires specialized targeting of your target customer segments.

The daily crowd passing through your door is so diverse that trying to segment your website to one specific group forfeits or at least imperils any business from other potentially interested clients. Once your customers find the door, experience shows that sales reps with the ability to sell to the customers according to the customer type and their interest guarantees success. These sales reps know how to better meet the needs and wants of the customer. Applying these truths to your "shop", your business’ website has to be able to adapt to the needs and wants of your many customer segments.

Some SEO Experts and consultants may disagree, but in truth, website optimization is not all about programming and code cleaning. Yes, these are important elements, but by no means are they the complete solution.

"Multi" as a Strategy

Marketing strategies must be multi-segmented in their targeting. Writing content for just one group discriminates against other target groups that would be interested in your product/service. The world is full of people from different backgrounds, understandings, and perspectives among a myriad of industries. Providing a single set of content that speaks to each group is capital to the success of your SEO projects and thus your marketing strategy. Any website that deals with multiple cultures and disparate views must use "Multi" Strategies.

"Multi" Strategies translate into specifically targeting many customer segments with the same content and website design for all users. Effective use of this kind of strategy minimizes the time it takes visitors to reach and understand the information they want. In SEO, if your site does not rank in the top twenty, the likelihood of you being noticed is minimal. This information age has created consumers accustomed to getting what they want faster. Their expectation is to find information quickly without having to wait. The same can be implied to the first few moments that your visitor spends on your site. They need to be able to take the content they find on the first page and extrapolate the info they need to know if they are going to want to learn more and begin an exchange. Using a "Multi" Strategy can facilitate the growth of your business but only if it’s educational and pertinent.

Effective Content

Deep insightful content that easily educates the reader will always be appreciated by your customers and potential clients. Effective content drives people to your site because the major search engines by some algorithmic system, determine that your site is worthy of their interest and time. While many have tried to find ways around these algorithms, rankings are becoming more merit based then by beating the Google Algorithm. This Google Algorithm rewards high rankings according to content and website structure. This is a good thing, more effective content and information exchange between client and business makes for better dealings and a better business environment.

Keeping this in mind, your content should or even must be relevant to your industry/business/product or services. Think and embrace the fact that not all users know your industry acronyms, catch phrases, and lingo. Not everyone truly understands and knows what they are looking for, and in many cases through education and understanding, your business will have a competitive advantage over others that fail to educate. The proverbial customer is smarter than they were yesterday, and want to be guided, not tricked, into making the right choice in products and services.

Quality Content, Where is It?

This strategy demands hours of attention. As an experienced SEO, I have learned that creating and producing content can be very time consuming, and not every website or business can provide great quantities of relevant content in a very short period of time.

An excellent way of creating content for your target audience is to obtain it straight from the source. Through the creation of web logs, forums, etc. and fostering customer participation in these forums, you find out the exact kind of topics your target audience is interested in. This provides an continual source of updated, rich content that touches the very nerves of your industry from every possible direction.

In writing this article, I’ve attempted to suggest some best practices and stir up some thought about the way we approach SEO and other business strategies. One suggestion that I put forth is effective, strategic partnerships with businesses that hold similar interests and can serve as tools for growth.

Combine and Conquer

Linked international associates connected via link exchange programs or other forms of association are crucial in any SEO strategy and in any type of industry. Facilitating strong relationships with your associates and networking partners will allow you to venture into new markets with the credibility and representational services your partner can provide.

Getting your partner’s experts to write articles regarding their business niche and expertise for publishing on your site can be an amazing source of quality content. A motivating factor for your partners and associates to participate in such a program is that it provides them with another form of exposure and a touch point for potential clients by circulating their name within your audience.

Making Your Choice

As a final suggestion and warning, I recommend that companies seeking to effectively grow their business online with quality information and multi-segmenting strategies be selective in the process of hiring an SEO consultant/services provider. Each company needs to assure that their SEO company will provide content creation and copyright services to insure ownership of the content. This is not a simple process and demands many hours of investment on your end, since every line of content needs to be approved, expertly maintained, and scoped for understanding for those within your business, your industry, and your niche.

Big Ideas from Small Businesses for Big Business

As a conclusion, the old truths that guided business during the last few centuries can still guide us today. We still need to get people to come through our doors to see what we have to offer. Once inside, we have to be effective in the way we sell to them by giving them information that they’re interested in learning about. Our sites can do this, but even with all the html tags, flash, and goodies we must undertake strategies that provide content and information incorporating the methods we’ve discussed.

Choosing your SEO service provider with these services already incorporated will prove to be a tremendous advantage in your strategy creation. Remember that SEO is not just a technical concept but is quickly becoming a new marketing/promotional method, which I like to call educational marketing. Teach and share your expertise and knowledge with others for a sure way to increase the attention and awareness of your ideas/message/business. Doing so makes business better for you, for your customer, and for your bottom line.

Search Engine Marketing Research Findings by Jimsun Lui

This research attempts to obtain business firms' views on search engine marketing. It gives valuable implications to both business and search engine marketing firms.

The research collects findings from 121 Hong Kong trading firms involving in foreign trade through telephone interview. Also, a separate focus group was held with 8 marketing managers and 1 search engine optimization (SEO) specialist. We believe the implications also apply to other geographical areas.

We have extracted part of the results to present in this article.

1. Employed SEO service or Exercised SEO Before?

103 (85%) respondents reported that they have neither employed any search engine optimization service nor self-exercised any search engine optimization service. However, 18 (15%) respondents pursued some sort of search engine marketing including search engine submission to search engine optimization.

2. Importance and Concerns of Search Engine Marketing/Search Engine Optimization

A rating scale of 1 to 5 was employed, with 5 means Very important and 1 means very unimportant. Respondents reported that they perceived that search engine marketing could be a cost-effective method to help them get new overseas customers (rating 4.7).

Respondents also considered the following factors whether they would use a search engine marketing firm: 1. Pricing (4.6), 2. Deliverables (4.8), 3. Guarantee Clause (4.0), 4. Ranking against rival firms (4.7), 5. Possibility to get to Top 10 ranking (4.1), 6. Chance to increase response rate (4.8)

3. Paid for Performance Search Engine Marketing

This question has an explanation about the meaning of paid for performance search engine marketing. The question includes pay-per-click and paid-for-inclusion plan.

Again, a rating scale of 1-5 was employed, with 5 means Very important and 1 means very unimportant.

The respondents expressed that they concerned the possible high cost (4.8), potential fraudulent clicks (4.9), delivery of message to right persons (4.7), and time required to manage the campaign (4.2).

4. Understanding of Search Engine Optimization

This question asked about their knowledge of search engine optimization techniques. Respondents were given 3 choices: 1. Yes, 2. No, 3. Don't know.

31 respondents perceived that the major task of search engine optimization was adding keywords in Title and Meta Tags while another 62 of them were not sure about the answers. 108 respondents did not know link building was an important factor that could help them improve search engine ranking. Interestingly, 72 respondents believed that program ¡§submit to 1000 search engines¡¨ could increase their website traffic. 101 respondents did not realize that content analysis and improvement measures such as keyword density ratio and keyword proximity ratio played a role in search engine optimization.

In general, most respondents believed that they did not possess sufficient knowledge on search engine optimization.

5. Focus Group

Another 8 marketing managers were invited to a focus group interview. 4 of them had experience in employing search engine optimization firms, and another 4 considered using search engine optimization services but finally had not taken action. An SEO specialist was acted as a moderator in the interview.

In the interview, they generally agreed that search engine marketing could help them to generate business leads. For those who did not use SEO service expressed that they abandoned to pursue as they could not make up a decision. First, they were not familiarize with how to achieve good search engine ranking. Second, the pricing scheme offered by different SEO firms varied greatly from US$19.99 to US$5,000 up-front fee, and some also required US$500 to US$5,000 monthly service fee. However, the SEO firms could not express clearly the deliverables that clients could obtain and they also refused to clearly explain the methodologies that they would use. These facts made the interviewees very difficult to persuade their boss to use SEO service.

In addition, the interviewees expressed that they feared that SEO firms would require many website changes, and some changes like keywords stuffing in Alt Tag or put too many texts and too little graphics in web pages make the site looked unprofessional.

Another point made by interviewees was very interesting. For those who have employed SEO firms, some of them perceived that they were being kept in the dark as they did not know what the SEO firms were actually doing! When they scrutinized the changes made by SEO firms, they found that the SEO firms have just written some keyword phrases in Alt Tag, Title Tag and repeated them in Meta Tags. Then, the SEO firms only ran reports for them in the subsequent months and asked them to wait for the results. Finally, they found that they had not got any extra traffic from keyword phrases suggested by SEO firms while the SEO firms claimed that they had achieved more than what was written in the guarantee clause (e.g. 20 Top 20 rankings in major search engines). Only 1 interviewee felt satisfied to the chosen SEO firm. This was because they knew the deliverable, got desirable number of top rankings, and a piece of link exchange software and they could continuously manage link building th emselves after the project end. The SEO firm also provided suggestions for them to maintain ranking afterwards.

Also, participants voiced out that they also wanted to know their search engine rankings against their rival firms.

6. Implications to Business Firms

In general, it was a consensus that search engine marketing could help to generate new business leads. However, it was not a simple activity. Most business firms lacked the knowledge and tempted to use an SEO firm. However, quality of SEO firms varied. In order to select a good SEO service, business firms should define clearly their objectives. E.g. some firms might simply define that they wanted a better ranking than their rivals or that they wanted a better conversion rate. Then, it was suggested that the business firms talk with the SEO candidates and try to differentiate which one was more knowledgeable. Moreover, business firms should discuss with the selected SEO firm in order to get an agreement on the number of deliverables and project schedule.

From the research findings, many business firms were yet to optimize their websites. That means if you first optimize your website, you could have an advantage over your rivals in search engine exposure perspective.

7. Implications to SEO firms

SEO firms should spend time and clearly explain to clients the SEO techniques and methodologies that they would use. Some SEO firms might fear that they would expose their ¡§top secret¡¨ techniques. However, you could not get business if your clients could not understand the SEO processes and failed to persuade their bosses. In addition, SEO firms should apply optimization techniques with a consideration of usability of websites. Do not make the site look silly or unprofessional. Also, clients would not mind your using of optimization software such as Webposition Gold and they do want to know how you would serve them.

SEO firms should assist clients to devise a measurement matrix for the campaign. This helps the decision maker to make judgment and explain to his/her colleagues and boss. Clients would feel more comfortable to do business with you.

Moreover, SEO firms should define clearly what would be delivered to clients and the delivery schedule, e.g. how many ranking reports, keyword research result, etc. In addition, SEO firms should contact clients frequently and report the progress. Clients would then understand that you were indeed working for them and you could help to set or adjust their expectations.

Finally, SEO firms should offer assistance for clients who want to terminate the relationship and to maintain rankings themselves. The idea looked ridiculous but the clients would be satisfied by such offer and would probably recommend you to other firms. After all, clients who ceased to work with you might be due to many other reasons but not your performance. Why don't you give them another ¡§candy¡¨ and maintain a good relationship?