WordCamp Melbourne: Essential SEO + Link Building 101, presented by Martin Reed of Dejan SEO.

1. Essential SEO + Link Building Martin Reed, SEO Strategist

2. It’s all about links!

3. Ranking Factors Relevance (context) Search for cars brings car related websites Importance (links) How to sort all 1,000,000,000 car websites?

4. Ranking Factors: Relevance Content How search engines “interpret” your site Writing language, use of phrases, industry jargon, common theme Technical Aspects How search engines “read” your site

5. Technical Aspects On-site signals: Page Titles <title>Page Title</title> Headings <h1>Heading 1</h1> Content Keyword Usage, Context, Semantics URL domain.com/file.html Images alt=“Image Description” Links <a href=http://site.com>anchor</a>......

6. Ranking Factors: Importance Reputation & Trust Who links to your site? Context How others link to you? Content type, link type (anchor text), site topic and relevance

10. Voting System VOTE Linker Linked Every link is a vote from one site to another: When you link to others you vote for them. When others link to you they vote for you.

11. Link Quality Not all links are equal: SITE A YOU SITE C

12. Link Quality & Quantity Number of outgoing links on site that links to you affects the link value. Less is better. SITE B SITE C SITE A SITE D YOU

13. No Follow? <a rel=“nofollow” href=“http://example.com”>anchor text</a> Nofollow = No trust = No vote META, robots.txt, link Example: Blog comments, Forums, Social Media SITE A SITE B

14. Anchor Text <a href=“http://example.com”>????????</a> Target phrases: you want to be found for Relevant to the page you’re linking to Avoid: ‘click here’, ‘read more’ This goes for internal linking too!

15. What to Target? Phrase Research Adwords Keyword Tool ‘Exact’ match filter Competitors Google/Yahoo – site:domain.com Advanced Tools (example: seomoz.org)

16. Let’s get some links!

17. Link Acquisition Methods Learn more about your existing links Google Webmaster Tools: Your website on the web Links to your site Analyse anchor text LINK: google.com/webmasters

18. How to get links?

19. Your Current Links Oh, nice!

21. Why did these people link to me? Analyse and understand your links Discover most linked content Find new link ideas Form new partnerships and alliances Fix unideal links

22. Self-Generating Links “Link to us” page: Encourage linking to your site. Take control of how people link to you. Make it easy for people to do so. Social media sharing within content Link Bait Material ‘Viral’ Useful Tools / Templates / Resources

23. Link Opportunities Business relationships Testimonials, reviews, media releases Design company, hosting company Industry associations & memberships Business directories Profile pages LinkedIn Media releases Competitor research

24. Link Opportunities Your clients Media release Footer ‘tag’ Example: Friendly

25. Link Opportunities Events you sponsor

26. Link Opportunities Events you speak at

27. WordPress optimisation

28. Technical Aspects Page Titles <title>Page Title</title> Key phrase for the page first Headings <h1>Heading 1</h1> Only structure your content, not the layout URL domain.com/file.html Enable Permalinks Images alt=“Image Description” Links <a href=http://site.com>anchor</a> Remove anchor text: ‘read more’

29. Meta Description Call to Action (CTA) ‘Sell’ the website to the visitor

31. Key features:

32. Canonical tag

33. Override page title & META descriptionEssential Plugins

37. Keyword rich URLFrom: /what-you-can-do-immediately-for-higher-rankings To: /immediately-higher-rankings

38. Essential Plugins Tynt.com For WordPress - Automatically credit source when text is copied from your website

40. Get access to Google Webmaster Tools