The letter seeking more clarification on behalf of “dozens” of human rights groups was written by Reps. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) and sent to Page last week, The Hill reported.

“Online markets provide traffickers with the ability to reach untold customers across all political jurisdictions,” reads their letter. “As a global leader and innovator in internet technologies, Google is in a unique position to do its part to fight human exploitation and trafficking, and we would encourage the company to proactively address these concerns.”

“Basic Idea is to level the playing ground a little bit. So all of those people who have sort of been doing…over-optimization or overly doing their SEO, compared to the people who are just making great content and trying to make a fantastic site, we want to sort of make that playing field a little bit more level. “

After news of the pending over optimization algorithm update hit the web the other week, a few of my clients wanted to know how this was going to affect their websites. Were their sites at risk of an over optimization penalty? I read a few more recaps of the panel discussion to get a better understanding of what exactly “over optimization” means to Google, and I told them that as long as their site has been practicing white hat SEO all along (which it definitely has since my company started managing it) then you are in no danger of being flagged for over optimization. Matt Cutts even admitted, “If you’re white hat or doing very little SEO, you’re not going to be affected by this change.”

This update is designed to help smaller, mom-and-pop websites that are producing great content and have user-friendly websites to perform better in the search engines, even if they don’t have the SEO budget to compete with the big brands. Personally, I think that’s great. There are plenty of smaller websites out there that do everything by the book when it comes to SEO, but they are blocked out of the SERPs because bigger brands can just dump money into their SEO campaigns. Giving these quality websites the opportunity to really make an impact in the search engines is long overdue.

To anyone with an SEO background, there are certain basic on-site SEO tasks that any web master, business owner, or Internet Marketer needs to be aware of. These include the following major components:

1 ) Title Tags - The title tag in your HTML meta code is the tag that tell the browser what to display in the title of the window at the very top of the screen. Because this text is so visible to the user, Google likes to rely heavily on this text as a clue as to what your page is about. As a result, it is a really important SEO strategy that your title tag be filled with keywords that are appropriate to the content of the web page. Furthermore, you really don’t want the same title tag on every page. This is not good for SEO. Instead, you want to have different keyword phrases in your title tags that properly identify the theme of that particular page. Remember, you are trying to help the search engines easily digest your content. That’s basically what SEO is. You want to aid them in their understanding of what this page is really about.

2 ) The first H1 tag - Similar to the title tag, Google will look at the first H1 text to appear on your page as a strong signal as to what the page is about. Use it wisely. Again, you want to place keyword phrases here that are thematically related to what the information on the page is conveying to the end-user.

3 ) The name of the page itself – As you name your pages in your web site, use plain English as much as possible for SEO. You will notice that WordPress uses this extensively in their blog software. This is no accident and WordPress is considered the best blog for SEO. For example, http://example.com/?On-Site-vs-Off-Site-SEO-tactics&AID=22 will perform much better for SEO than http://example.com/?AID=22. Why? Because there is descriptive text in the longer version of the page name that helps the search engine know what the page is about. Many people have written about issues around “dirty links” and SEO (links including system variable data such as AID=22 in the example above). I think it is better if you can design your system without any variable data at all. It just takes this SEO issue away. And it’s just easier for the search engines. It’s also easier for the end-user. However, there is no problem promoting pages via SEO with variable data in the links. I’ve been able to make both fly using the same SEO tactics with no problems. The search engines are smart enough by now to manage through that variable data. Just make sure your plain English is in there.

4 ) Keyword meta tag - This tag used to get a ton of play for SEO, but is now largely ignored by the search engines. I believe it fell out of favor due to manipulation and misuse. It is a tag that is not seen by the end-user, so unscrupulous web masters abused it and it became less-and-less important for SEO. Real SEO tactics don’t abuse or deceive. I still populate my keyword tags because I believe they are still looked at, but I don’t believe they are very critical. If nothing else, it’s another instance of your keywords. They all help SEO.

5 ) Description meta tag – This tag is still useful, but probably more for Yahoo and MSN. Since you will be in this part of your web site anyway to get the Title right, you might as well make this variable-driven as well and make the description appropriate to the page. Again, it can’t hurt SEO.

6 ) Keyword Density - This is very important for SEO. Keep in mind that the search engines are just large computer programs digesting your site and trying to figure out what it is about. One of the simplest things they do is to count up all the words and look for repeats. They then calculate percentages, or densities, of specific 1-word, 2-word and 3-word phrases that are found in your text. By looking at the most popular keyword phrases, their programs understand the important themes of your page. If you observe your own writing on a specific subject, you will see the patterns as well. I don’t recommend that you write solely with keyword density in mind as it will result in lower quality content. However, I also don’t recommend that you completely ignore keyword density in your content creation. My preferred approach is to write content straight-up for the first draft. Then, as you edit for grammar, consistency, and clarity, also edit for density. Run your content through a density checker and see what phrases are used the most. Make adjustments accordingly so that your top themes / keyword phrases are showing up between 2-4% of the time. But don’t do this to the extent that anything reads as unnatural. You need to always keep your audience in mind.

7 ) Outbound links - What your page links to matters, in terms of both the quality and quantity of links. As you build links out of your page, be specific about where they go. Don’t link to low-quality or bad-neighborhood sites. Also watch your number of links. Generally, the less the better. However, having no outbound links is not always good. I believe Google uses your outbound links as a way to position your site in the vast weave that is the Internet. Often times, Google can get a good feeling about what your site is about just by looking at who you link to. So again, select these links wisely understanding they will actually impact your SEO.

8 ) High-quality, original, content - I probably should have put this first because it can’t be stressed enough for SEO. Your site needs to provide high-quality and original content. You will read this maybe a hundred times as you research SEO. Content is king. And I firmly believe this to be true. If you are under the impression that the internet is so big that search engines can’t identify content as really unique, guess again. One afternoon spent playing with CopyScape will convince you that there is technology available today that is able to tell you if any given sentence has been repeated anywhere on the Internet. It’s staggering, actually, when you really think about that. The volumes of data are just outrageous. But if CopyScape can do it, I’m betting that Google can do it also. And I firmly believe that your site receives a positive bump when Google determines that the content is original. Many people have asked me if using content that is repeated on other sites will penalize the site. I believe the answer is no, you will not be penalized by Google (copyright infringement is a completely different and very serious legal topic that I won’t go into today). But I also believe that you won’t get where you want to be by using content that already has high mileage. The other hot debate related to how sites using duplicate content can actually rank higher than the site where the content originated from. Yes – This has been demonstrated empirically a bunch of times. But you don’t need to be too concerned with that for reasons we will get into later. Just keep your eye on the ball. Put in the time, energy and creativity it takes to create unique content and you will be rewarded. Plain and simple.

9 ) Appropriate amounts of content – Somewhat different from #8 is the issue of how much content to put on your site for good SEO. I don’t believe there is a single magic answer as each site has a different objective. But as far as SEO goes, I generally believe the more the better (assuming you are following #8). Give those hungry spiders as much food for thought as you possibly can. But let me also qualify that statement. You need ensure that your content doesn’t stray too far from the core message of your site. If it does, this can create confusion around what your site is really about. Tightly focused sites perform much better than more generically focused sites. For example, a site selling used Honda Civics that uses appropriate SEO strategies will probably get ranked higher and faster than a more generalized site selling all types of used cars. This is a generic statement, and there are many exceptions, but it’s a reasonable place to start your thinking about niches and themes.

Source:

You may have seen all the best SEO tips every where but I doubt you can find one that can be as comprehensive and updated as this one. It will be constantly updated (if there is going to be any changes) to make sure that the latest tips on SEO can be shared with you and I will place a link within the “SEO” page to make sure that you can easily navigate here.

SEO Tip 1: Choose Single Or Multiple Keywords – Keyword Sniping Vs Multi-Keyword Targeting

Decide whether your website is targeting on a single keyword or a few keywords. In my opinion, each has its own pros and cons. Single keyword or keyword sniping allows you to focus on one keyword which means you may have very little topic to write about. Working on several keywords might lose your focus but each keyword can back one another up in case any of them fails.

Important note: If you choose multiple keywords, make sure your keywords do not belong to different niches. They should belong to the same niche. Otherwise, search engines would be confused what your website is all about. Makes sense right?

SEO Tip 2: Choose A Right Keyword – General Terms Vs Specific Keyword Phrases

Choose either a general term eg. “SEO” or specific keyword phrase eg. “daily tips on SEO” that you wish to optimize for your website. A general term is typically a highly competitive keyword which is very difficult to rank high easily in search engines since there are so many competitions. However, a general term would draw more searches.

A specific keyword phrase draws lesser searches but drives more targeted traffic. For short term SEO, it is recommended to go for specific keyword phrase but for long term SEO, you may like to invest the time and effort into working on general term. At this point of time, honestly speaking, I would recommend you to go for a specific keyword phrase because the general term market is very much saturated now.

SEO Tip 3: Add New And Unique Contents Daily

Blog is a great way to add new content to your website daily. Search engines prefer websites that are updated regularly. News have been heard that search engines are now more favorable with website contents. To be considered as unique, your web page or blog post has to be at least 30% different from any other web page on the internet. Also remember to create your web page with the the keyword(s) you identified in point (2).

SEO Tip 4: Work On Keyword Density But Not Keyword Stuffing

Keyword density refers to the number of times a keyword or a keyword phrase appears in a web page in proportion with other words. The more times it appear over the total number of words, the greater the overall keyword density. It has been recommended that 3% – 7% of keyword density will drive more traffic to your website without being penalized by search engines. However, stuffing your entire web page with too many keywords will not only get you penalized, but drive your readers away too.

SEO Tip 5: Work On Keyword Proximity, Keep The Words Together

It will increase your search engine value if you try to keep your the words of your keyword phrase together. Example, the keyword phrase “best SEO tips and secrets” would carry more weight than “best SEO secrets and tips” if you are targeting at the keyword “SEO tips”. See the difference?

SEO and positioning your website to rank top spots in the search engines require some careful planning. Just like setting up a business or going to war, it requires strategizing for optimal results. Diving straight into the internet without any clear game plan is time-wasting, dangerous and more often than not, a futile attempt to rank any website for maximum targeted traffic. Let’s dwell a little deeper into some useful SEO and positioning tips to get your web pages indexed and ranking faster.

1. SEO and Positioning Tip 1 – Determine Your Objective

What is your objective in optimizing your website? Is it for maximum general traffic or targeted niche traffic? Once again, webmasters are unable to get this part clear. Many think that driving as much traffic as possible to their websites is the way to go. Unfortunately, this is a big pitfall. A web site may attract loads of traffic but yet don’t perform as well as another with little traffic but making more sales. Know what your objective is, to sell more products or to get more people to visit your website. If you are building an interest-based website or hobby website, perhaps getting maximum general traffic is the right solution for you.

2. SEO and Positioning Tip 2 – Plan Your Keywords Right

This is applicable for all websites that intend to tap into free organic traffic. By that, I mean SEO and positioning high in search engines for specific keywords. One clue for you before you compile your keyword list is to understand that search engines rank individual web pages, not websites. The systematic way to do it is to first look at your objective of SEO and positioning. If you are targeting a niche market, for example SEO tools, target the niche keyword SEO tools for your home page, and drill into this main keyword for related keywords such as SEO Elite, effective SEO tools, etc to target for each internal web page.

Don’t make the mistake like many webmasters do in targeting one main keyword for the entire website. The smart approach to SEO and positioning is to target a list of low competition, moderate demand keywords and rank well for them. This would potentially drive more targeted traffic, than to blindly hit at one main keyword.

3. SEO and Positioning Tip 3 – Simple Well-Thought On-page Optimization

Use your keywords in the meta-tags, web page title, sub-headers and web content. Make your web content unique. A keyword density of 3-6% and word count of more than 400 words is ideal for on-page optimization. Create a sitemap page to make search engines spiders love your web pages. This helps in indexing the internal pages fast.

4. SEO and Positioning Tip 4 – Effective Off-page Optimization Techniques

Building link popularity of a website is far more crucial than any other factors for SEO and positioning for top search engine ranking. But pay attention to who your link partners are. Trade links with websites in a similar niche, and high Google PR if possible. Links from authority websites such as educational or government websites, ie domain names with .edu or .gov extensions are valuable. Buying links from link partners is perfectly fine if you can verify the quality of the websites. Search engines nowadays can be quite demanding and look for quality more than quantity of links.

First of all, select the right targeted keywords for your web page. Please don’t do the mistake of selecting the most popular keywords. Instead you can use Google’s keyword suggestion tool to select the most appropriate variations considering both popularity as well as competition. During this process please make sure that keyword phrases should be related to your website content as without that the entire process will be of no use.

Before you start with Off-Page optimization like Building backlinks and generating traffic, you have to make sure that the keywords are placed in the right spot. No page will get ranked if you haven’t clearly indicated exactly what keyword’s the page should be ranked for.

The Basic Steps to get ranked for the Targeted Keywords are:

1) Keyword in the URL
2) Keyword in the title
3) Keyword in the only <h1> tag
4) Keyword Usage in Body

1. Keyword in the URL

Just make sure that your URL is in the form www.example.com/keyword (.htm or .php or .aspx or whatever). Avoid URLs without the keyword eg www.example.com/products.htm?id=12. For the URL it is best to have only the keyword and no other junk.

2. Keyword in the title

It is also recommended to use the keyword in the page title, eg “Keyword (with some wording included) | Example.com”.  Do not repeat titles on all your pages, and do not dilute keywords by using the same keyword in all your titles. Every internal page should consists a Unique page title.

3. Keyword in the only <h1> tag.

When you describe your Targetted Keyword, there should be a header above your description.  Just add <h1> tags, eg <h1>Targetted Keyword</h1>. The title should also have some extra wording that is different from the title wording.

4. Keyword Usage in Body

Please make sure that the content that you posted is Keyword Rich.. Because Google Algorithms are more sensitive to pages that do not contain the keyword they’re getting links for. Do not spam the keyword though! Just use it a few times, naturally. (Keyword Desnity of 2%-6%)

So stop trying to implement all the hundreds of factors that could possibly help you rank higher. Unless you are done with these basic steps do not move on.

This collection of link building tips are likely to guarantee that you will receive free links from already established websites. This differs from content-oriented development strategies which hope to gradually attract natural editorial links.

These link building tips focus more on targeted link placement or link insertion, whereby you are likely to control the specific anchor text used. Some of them include agreements made with others and others involve one-way action on your part.

CASE # 1

1. Submit your site to Web Directories. This is a pretty monotonous process that can get you several hundred backlinks if you have the time. An alternative would be to hire a manual directory submitter. Here’s a list of web directories you can use. You can also find some blog directories here.
2. Submit Press Releases to PR Sites. A basic press release about your website’s launch can be released to several PR websites, who will distribute it to various online news outlets. A good way to get a free link. I recommend using PRWeb and PRLeap.
3. Reciprocal Links with Similar Websites. Its important to pick sites that are of high relevance so you’ll not only get links but traffic. Reciprocal linking can be useful from the beginning but don’t overdo it. You can find link partners by emailing them directly or searching through webmaster forums.
4. Web 2.0 Pages A Squidoo lens is fairly easy to create. It only takes around 15 minutes to set up one fully and you’ll be able to insert a bunch of anchor text links to your website along with your feed content. Hubpages is another similar site you can use.
5. Article Submissions. Create a short article on your niche topic and submit it to article directories for a backlink and some traffic. You might get more links if your article is picked up and published on other websites. Here is a list of article directories, sorted by Alexa and PageRank.
6. Social Media Profiles. There a whole bunch of social websites online which allow you to insert a link to your website on the profile page. Sign up for some of them, preferably using a username and avatar that brands your business or you as a person. This might come in useful when you decide to promote your site via the social website in the future. Ex: Twitter, FaceBook
7. Social Bookmarking/Voting Websites. Certain social voting websites like Netscape or Digg are often crawled by search engines and their links do help to get a website indexed. 3spots has the biggest list of social voting and bookmarking websites I’ve seen so far.

CASE # 2

1. Forum Signatures. Sign up for some forums in your niche and start contributing to ongoing discussions. Insert a link to the homepage or some inner pages of your site.
2. Create a Tool, Theme or Widget. Pay a designer to come up with an add-on application or template that is related to a specific social network, popular website or platform. Include a credit link that points back to your designated website.
3. Blogs on Other Blog Platforms. Use existing blogs you have on other blog networks. Or set up different versions of your blog on different blog networks like WordPress.com, Blogger and Xanga. Link to specific webpages on your website.
4. Comment on Other Blogs. Start commenting on relevant and popular sites in your niche. Don’t just spam for links but focus on building a relationship with other bloggers as well. Write a relevant comment and try to avoid using keyword names or signature links.
5. Guest posting on other blogs. Like article and press releases, this one involves having readily available content you can send out to certain blogs in your niche. This is great for getting relevant links and traffic.
6. Hold Contests. Some websites often offer contests in a bid to attract anchor text links from bloggers. An example is this iPhone giveaway on Gary Lee’s site. Contests allow you to determine the specific anchor text but its possible that too many links using the designated keyword may harm your domain instead.
7. Collaborative Projects. You may need to develop an article specifically for a writing project, blog carnival or meme but it will usually get you a couple of backlinks, depending on the number and generosity of the participants involved.
8. Offer your Expertise. This will apply if you have a specific skill set such as web design, copywriting, translation or SEO. Write to an established website and offer to revamp/optimize their website in return for a mention or credit link on a webpage. This offers excellent branding, particularly if your offer is picked up by a website with a decent audience.