A while back, I wrote a post about how important content is, and how you cannot sacrifice content for the sake of SEO. Well, we should all learn that you don’t have to sacrifice one of those for the other–they are both very important! The goal is to have both quality content, and good SEO so that you can bring in the readers to look at your material. That is certainly a challenge, but one that I need to tackle (and I suspect there are plenty of other readers out there in the same boat!)

I came across a free e-book that I thought I would share with you, which is aimed at helping to improve SEO for your websites. It is written by Brad Callen, who is the creator of the SEO Elite software (which could be a huge help to you in producing sites with high page rank!) This e-book has a tremendous amount of information, as well as resources for you to be able to improve your Search Engine rankings.

Make sure to read the whole book. There are nuggets of information from the beginning to the end. If you are brand new to marketing on the internet, and want to get a jump on the learning curve, this will help you out a lot. So, take a few minutes to sit down and read this great material, and put the suggestions into practice. Brad will take you from just starting out to the point of driving great, targeted traffic to your site.

Get the free e-book by clicking this link: SEO Made Easy.

If you need a PDF reader, make sure to check out my post on the Foxit Reader!

I was reading a post over at copyblogger today that really drove an important point home. When it comes to writing posts, far too many people try to write in a very unnatural way, driving up their keyword count. Evidently, some writers think that keyword density is really more important than quality writing. Now, I don’t claim to be a professional writer, but I do have what I think is my own natural style. I try to write in “my style”, and then, secondarily, worry about keyword density.

Matthew, over at coppyblogger had this to say:

But in the wake of SEO-ing, SMO-ing, and all other types of O-ing we face the danger of falling into a trap. We must always remember that the quality of the content is paramount and be vigilant not to sacrifice that quality upon the altar of optimization.

I love that last line. Don’t sacrifice your quality of writing for search engine optimization. I have read some blogs where you don’t have to wonder what words the author is trying to rank high for…the phrase is used every other line, whether it fits in or not. Writing like that can certainly turn off readers. Instead, authors should write more naturally about a subject that interests them, and the key words will take care of themselves! Of course, you can go back through what you have written, and try identify places where you can reword to put in a couple more keywords, but make sure that the changes do not make your post sound choppy, or forced.

I have read other blogs that have great keyword density, but you don’t even notice because the flow of the article is so well done. They can produce a post with a great keyword density, but you don’t even realize what their targeted word or phrase is, because the writing is so well formulated

Developing a readership is one of the most important aspects of writing a successful blog. If your writing style is a turn-off, then you won’t get very many repeat readers. You need to have valuable information, but you also must write it in a way that is readable. Again, I don’t claim to be an expert in this area, and I am trying to learn how to do a better job. But, when you are using your keywords, make sure that they fit in with the flow of your writing.

So, remember that SEO is important for gaining search engine traffic, but a good writing style is important to maintain a readership. Write good articles, and you will be more successful with your blog.

A fellow blogger pointed me in the direction of this tool, and it seems to be a very good one. The Website Grader will evaluate your site and make suggestions of how to make it better (from a SEO standpoint). This tool is extremely easy to use, and will provide valuable suggestions for improving your search rankings on the web.

Start by simply putting your website address in the proper place. This is all the information that you HAVE to put into the form. You don’t even have to enter your email at the bottom of the form (though it appears that you do when you read it the first time). By simply processing with this limited information, you can get some general information about your site:

• Meta Data summary: Are your title, keywords and description meta tags filled in properly? That is an easy thing to fix if you have yet to enter these meta tags.
• Heading Tags: How many heading tags are found through the web page? For blogs, this will pull up the number of post titles on the first page, and probably your categories list.
• Image Summary: This will tell you how many images you have on the page, and make a suggestion about whether you have too many images. It will also tell you how many pictures are not tagged with alternate text–something that will certainly help with search rankings if you tag them with something that is relevant.
• Interior Page Summary: This will give you information about some of your second level pages. It will evaluate your meta tags, and tell you if there are elements missing that can help your rankings.
• Readability Rating: It is suggested that a site (like a newspaper) be on a lower reading level so that it will appeal to more people. Of course there are exceptions to the rule, but you are probably looking for a broad readership. This rating will tell you where you stand as far as your reading level, so that you can alter your style if necessary.
• Domain Info: This tells you how long the domain has been registered, and when the current registration expires. Evidently, Google and other search engines frown on any domain that will expire within one year. This is a direct result of unscrupulous people putting up sites for a brief period of time, and then pulling them down.
• Google Information: This tool will give you your Google Page Rank, as well as several other statistics. It will tell you how many pages of your site are indexed by Google. It will also tell you when Google last crawled your website.
• Alexa Rank: This will tell you where you are in the Alexa ranking system. It will also give you a percentage ranking, so that you have something real to grab onto. How does your site or blog rank in comparison to all other sites?
• Inbound Links: This will tell you how many other sites are linking to you. This is one of the most important elements in optimizing a site for search engines. Google, for example, will rate a site higher if it has more links coming into it. Exchanged links are good, but links that come into your site, without being reciprocated, are the best.
• Directory Information: The report gives your directory status for 3 different directories: DMOZ, Yahoo, and ZoomInfo. It is important to get your site out there in the directories, as this is one of the best ways to get visitors to your site. However, it can take a long time to actually get listed in many directories.
• Social Mediasphere: This tool will search Digg and del.icio.us bookmarks to see if your material has been submitted. It will tell you how much content has been added to these services.

If you add in more information in your search, you can actually get some comparative data to other web sites. You can find out how your pages compare to others for specific topics, or search terms. You can track competing websites and see what they are doing better than you–things you can change to compete better.

Most of the suggestions made by this tool are easy to do, and won’t take you much time. Try it out, make the changes, and see if you start getting some more hits to your site from the search engines!