HOT TOPIC AMA: SEO

[Menery]

I don't know how to read this. Is it saying the URL based upon a location and include multiple topics?

I drew it for better reading:



So basically you are creating a topical silo on the right site, everything is interlinked and daisy-chained with supporting blog posts. And all of these point to the /locations page which basically only functions as a hub-page where you just list all your locations.

The service pages all mention the Services but never link back to the actual service pages nor the /locations page.

Whats your take on this? Are you creating combinations of location + service? I used to do this but it just gets so bloated very fast.

 

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[lludwig]

I drew it for better reading:

View attachment 31853

So basically you are creating a topical silo on the right site, everything is interlinked and daisy-chained with supporting blog posts. And all of these point to the /locations page which basically only functions as a hub-page where you just list all your locations.

The service pages all mention the Services but never link back to the actual service pages nor the /locations page.

Whats your take on this? Are you creating combinations of location + service? I used to do this but it just gets so bloated very fast.

I haven't done a locations based site. What I can say from others is it depends upon the keyword volume. If something is location based (ie plumber) then you better designed your site so people can find you based upon the location first. If a location is a low end search then I wouldn't designed the site around location.

 

[RisingStars]

Thank you for doing this AMA @lludwig

I have a small niche brand mostly selling on Amazon right now but also have my own online store. In the past few weeks I've read and learned a little bit about SEO but struggle with the following.
For my niche and product categories I did a basic keyword research. Now I've created a keyword map to match the keywords I want to rank for to certain URLs on my page.
I've read that it's a good idea to take a look at what already ranks under a certain keyword and then produce content or rank pages that are competitive.
e.g. if someone is searching for informational keywords, I would try to rank a blog post / guide.
if someone searches for a transactional keyword in my niche I would try to rank a category / product page.

My issue is that in the top results of the lucrative keywords only big stores who feature multiple brands rank with their category pages.
I only have 1-2 products for each category (like other brands).
Since google ranks shops with a selection of different brands and products, is it safe to say that it is not possible for a product page or category page with 1 product to rank?
How would your SEO strategy for such a brand look like?

 

[lludwig]

My issue is that in the top results of the lucrative keywords only big stores who feature multiple brands rank with their category pages.
I only have 1-2 products for each category (like other brands).
Since google ranks shops with a selection of different brands and products, is it safe to say that it is not possible for a product page or category page with 1 product to rank?
How would your SEO strategy for such a brand look like?

Then the chances of you ranking for it are low. You don't have the domain authority or amount of backlinks to the article.

I would go a different route. Either go for longer tailed keywords for that product like: specific version/model/color/attribute

OR

Go solution based keyword searches - 'best widget to solve X' or 'Alternatives to Y'

Also, the content should be unique, not some generic from the manufacture that every one uses. Add value where no one is doing. Can you create a tool, can you compare against other products, can you create how-to videos to help? Can you bundle products that are purchased together.. etc...

 

[RisingStars]

Thank you!

 

[Laughingman21]

What advice would you suggest in the following situation?

I’ve launched a new store into a reasonably new market reselling other brands products. For the sake of this example, let’s say it’s vegan products and I sell a range of dairy alternatives from a mix of new and established brands.

I’m currently paying for most of my traffic and that’s not a sustainable long term plan so I want to improve my SEO. I’m currently no where on Google for popular phrases like "vegan cheeses”.

So far, I’ve tried to improve my on page SEO by improving product descriptions, added images with alt text, shortened urls, added page headings, added a blog (but posting every 2-3 weeks).

I’m struggling to see how to get people to link to me. Should I be targeting longer tail keyword and posting blogs like “5 best vegan friendly cheeses” and asking people to link to that.

I’m currently trying a bit of everything and don’t feel I’m making any progress. Any suggestions or guidance in which direction you’d put your effort in would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance for your help.

 

[lludwig]

What advice would you suggest in the following situation?

I’ve launched a new store into a reasonably new market reselling other brands products. For the sake of this example, let’s say it’s vegan products and I sell a range of dairy alternatives from a mix of new and established brands.

I’m currently paying for most of my traffic and that’s not a sustainable long term plan so I want to improve my SEO. I’m currently no where on Google for popular phrases like "vegan cheeses”.

So far, I’ve tried to improve my on page SEO by improving product descriptions, added images with alt text, shortened urls, added page headings, added a blog (but posting every 2-3 weeks).

I’m struggling to see how to get people to link to me. Should I be targeting longer tail keyword and posting blogs like “5 best vegan friendly cheeses” and asking people to link to that.

I’m currently trying a bit of everything and don’t feel I’m making any progress. Any suggestions or guidance in which direction you’d put your effort in would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Well I think there's multiple questions you have to ask yourself, some you've already asked.

- Why would someone link to your product pages?
- What content can you create better or different than others?
- Can you create recipes on how to cook the various 'vegan cheeses'
- Can you create comparisons of other products in your store?

Some of them have no relation to SEO and more of a business strategy. Basically what value are you creating for others?

"Should I be targeting longer tail keyword and posting blogs like “5 best vegan friendly cheeses” and asking people to link to that."

Yes if there's mid-high level competing sites already for the shorter tailed keywords. With SEO you are trying to create clear signals you are the authority in said topics. What can you do to increase your E-A-T with Google and more importantly possible customers?

 

[Laughingman21]

Great, thanks. I'll put my efforts into producing some new content to link to.

Do you have any tips on:

• how to find sites that will give backlinks?
• how to approach those sites and ask for the link?

 

[lludwig]

Great, thanks. I'll put my efforts into producing some new content to link to.

Do you have any tips on:

• how to find sites that will give backlinks?
• how to approach those sites and ask for the link?

I've always focused on the content first since you have control over this. This includes UX/UI issues.

Only then do I approach backlinks. Getting those backlinks isn't so easy. That's a topic into itself. What I can say create content and research that helps others so they would want to share. If it's just a product page, no one will care.

There are a few articles out there on possible ways. None of them are easy and none are assured. Unless you do blackhat SEO techniques (ie paid backlinks) which I don't recommend.

 

[AnMSo]

Hi Larry,
Thanks a lot for this AMA.

What' s your approach with keyword research?
Do you only use transactional kw? Do you believe in Keyword Difficulty blindly ( Ahrefs) or are there other factors that you take into consideration that are not included in the KD score?
Whats your opinion on the Keyword Golden Ratio method?

This is more of a personal question but since it seems that in SEO content is the name of the game ¿ Do you think that Digital Marketing as a profession is just about writing and writing?

And last, how would you drive traffic to a new website in the shortest amount of time? Since SEO takes a bit of time ( Besides paid ).

Thank you again.

 

[lludwig]

Hi Larry,
Thanks a lot for this AMA.

What' s your approach with keyword research?
Do you only use transactional kw?

No I make sure I'm covering all aspects of search, from top of funnel to further down closer to the sale. Your content should then reflect this.

The example I always use is the difference between "what is a mortgage" and "best mortgage rate" the intent is much different. The content should reflect this. Meaning "What is a mortgage" should not be as transactional as "best mortgage rate".

Do you believe in Keyword Difficulty blindly ( Ahrefs) or are there other factors that you take into consideration that are not included in the KD score?

I use as guidelines. Keep in mind it is backwards looking. One way to get an edge is plan for an increase in keywords. Great example is with this recent pandemic. Keywords like "N95 mask" took off. If you just looked at the previous history in ahrefs or Google Trends it wouldn't tell you this.

Whats your opinion on the Keyword Golden Ratio method?

Today? Garbage. The Burt update from the data I've seen made that useless. Though question how effective it was previous. I never followed it and did fine.

This is more of a personal question but since it seems that in SEO content is the name of the game ¿ Do you think that Digital Marketing as a profession is just about writing and writing?

If anything no far from it.. I consider content a commodity. You need to add value via other ways. There is only so many ways to discuss a said topic. You need to add value via apps, widgets, and functionality. You need good content, yes, but that is easily replicated. Website functionality is much harder to replicate.

And last, how would you drive traffic to a new website in the shortest amount of time? Since SEO takes a bit of time ( Besides paid ).

Paid, hands down gives you the quickest results to know if you are hanging your ladder on the right wall. You can then pursue SEO for that same keyword if it makes sense.

Your options are kinda of limited for instant results.

 

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[AnMSo]

Thanks a lot for your very helpful and complete comment Larry !

I just have one last question. When you do your kw research and niche selection:¿Do you do it based on the affiliate program you are trying to promote/sell or based on the level of competition? Would you do it this way:

product/affiliate program<---- Kw research<--etc...

I suppose it's better to find something that has low comp plus an affiliate program along.

Thank you again.

 

[WowVisible]

Being an SEO Expert for more than 10 years now, @lludwig is exactly right. Start working on your onsite first. Take a look at the following:
1. quality of your content - make sure you can hold the interest of your visitors to stay longer; a high bounce rate means your content is not good.

2. speed of your site matters - it should be not beyond 5 seconds; use gtmetrix.com or Google Pagespeed to check your speed and follow their guidelines for fixing speed issues of your site

3. internal linking - proper internal linking can help greatly to boost the page authority of service or product pages and also overall domain authority; my strategy for this is to make use of blog posts to link to your important pages. Also, sprinkling high authority external links can help.

You may check the attachment of samples of my SEO results. Let me share you my complete Organic SEO plan that I'm using with my clients. Organic SEO Tracker

I'm open to answering here your questions for the details of my plan.

 

[lludwig]

Thanks a lot for your very helpful and complete comment Larry !

I just have one last question. When you do your kw research and niche selection:¿Do you do it based on the affiliate program you are trying to promote/sell or based on the level of competition? Would you do it this way:

product/affiliate program<---- Kw research<--etc...

I suppose it's better to find something that has low comp plus an affiliate program along.

Thank you again.

I would say a combination of making sure we cover all aspects of the topic in question. Regardless of if they are transactional or not. Second then also make sure you have the "money" pages that are transactional as well.

 

[DST]

Some new domains consists of words that are integrated with the full domain, does that give SEO benefits?

i.e. would a domain that is https://icecre.am give benefits when searching for "icecream"? (domain is hypothetical and does not exist)

 

[lludwig]

Some new domains consists of words that are integrated with the full domain, does that give SEO benefits?

i.e. would a domain that is https://icecre.am give benefits when searching for "icecream"? (domain is hypothetical and does not exist)

More previous years. While helpful somewhat it isn't as important as it used to be. What more important is the TLD extension (ie. .com via .xyz), how long the domain is registered for and how long ago the domain was registered.

 

[VTK]

If a small but established site has a disorganised URL structure, would you recommend re-organising it or is that likely to negatively impact existing page rankings?

Basically we started our site years back with very little knowledge and managed to rank top on our most important transactional keywords for our location. We also have some highish traffic blog posts, although that traffic doesn't really convert much.

We'd like to rank for new high traffic keywords and also expand our business and rank our site for new locations. The problem is that our home page is optimised only for our current location and our blog has no organisational structure. I'm concerned Google is rewarding our site for being specifically focused around one location for our products and it will be hard to rank for new locations without becoming less relevant for our current one.

So we have:

• Our home page (optimised for our location and our products).
• Product pages linked from the home page (we no-indexed them because the home page and product pages were competing and the home page ranked higher. Not sure if there was a better thing to do here).
• And random blog posts with topical urls (e.g mysite/post-title)

And we now need to add new locations and want to tidy up the blog and start loading on more awesome content.

I'm concerned if I leave our current home page alone (optimised for current location) and just add extra pages for any new locations we expand to, it will make it hard to rank for those new locations. I'm also concerned if we make a more generic homepage which lists all new locations and change our current home page to a location page, we'll lose top ranking for our current location.

With the blog I'm wondering whether to tidy up url structures or leave it alone? E.g Change successful page urls to all match a mysite.com/blog/post-title or mysite.com/category/post-title format. Would that damage the ranking of already successful pages? Are the potential gains from an organised site architecture worth the risks that come with changing things?

Any thoughts or ideas would be hugely appreciated. I'm super keen to get on with improving things but really don't want to feck up what we've already done.

 

[lludwig]

If a small but established site has a disorganised URL structure, would you recommend re-organising it or is that likely to negatively impact existing page rankings?

Basically we started our site years back with very little knowledge and managed to rank top on our most important transactional keywords for our location. We also have some highish traffic blog posts, although that traffic doesn't really convert much.

We'd like to rank for new high traffic keywords and also expand our business and rank our site for new locations. The problem is that our home page is optimised only for our current location and our blog has no organisational structure. I'm concerned Google is rewarding our site for being specifically focused around one location for our products and it will be hard to rank for new locations without becoming less relevant for our current one.

You are saying one physical location?

So we have:

• Our home page (optimised for our location and our products).
• Product pages linked from the home page (we no-indexed them because the home page and product pages were competing and the home page ranked higher. Not sure if there was a better thing to do here).

That's very unusual to see this happen. Usually, a home page lacks the content needed to rank for a keyword like this, but don't know specifics with your page content and the competing pages. Obviously, the home page lacks a CTA so people buy the product which stinks IMHO.

• And random blog posts with topical urls (e.g mysite/post-title)

And we now need to add new locations and want to tidy up the blog and start loading on more awesome content.

I'm concerned if I leave our current home page alone (optimised for current location) and just add extra pages for any new locations we expand to, it will make it hard to rank for those new locations. I'm also concerned if we make a more generic homepage which lists all new locations and changes our current home page to a location page, we'll lose top ranking for our current location.

Yes all of this could happen, but not sure how easy it is to rank for that location and keyword combo. Most cases it isn't that high competing that you couldn't do what you describe and make a new subpage rank for the keyword and location.

With the blog I'm wondering whether to tidy up url structures or leave it alone? E.g Change successful page urls to all match a mysite.com/blog/post-title or mysite.com/category/post-title format.

This is an easy answer. things like /tag/ /blog/ /category/ in the URL (not the tag or category names itself ie. /category/ not /web-hosting/ ) serve no value. So they should be removed.

Would that damage the ranking of already successful pages? Are the potential gains from an organised site architecture worth the risks that come with changing things?

Any thoughts or ideas would be hugely appreciated. I'm super keen to get on with improving things but really don't want to feck up what we've already done.

For something like this bite the bullet and make the change. Of course, make sure you do 301 redirects so sites pointing to these pages are redirected. Plus make sure all internal links point to the new pages. you should avoid redirections since you control your own pages.

 

[VTK]

You are saying one physical location?



That's very unusual to see this happen. Usually, a home page lacks the content needed to rank for a keyword like this, but don't know specifics with your page content and the competing pages. Obviously, the home page lacks a CTA so people buy the product which stinks IMHO.



Yes all of this could happen, but not sure how easy it is to rank for that location and keyword combo. Most cases it isn't that high competing that you couldn't do what you describe and make a new subpage rank for the keyword and location.




This is an easy answer. things like /tag/ /blog/ /category/ in the URL (not the tag or category names itself ie. /category/ not /web-hosting/ ) serve no value. So they should be removed.



For something like this bite the bullet and make the change. Of course, make sure you do 301 redirects so sites pointing to these pages are redirected. Plus make sure all internal links point to the new pages. you should avoid redirections since you control your own pages.

Hey thanks a lot for that and yeah our current website (and business) is optimised all around one city so far but we're looking at opening in new cities.

 

[Datingafter35]

I already did one on affiliate marketing, let's try one on SEO.

AMA: SEO.

My Background: I've been developing websites for 25 years+, and had an affiliate blog for 10 years which 80% of the traffic was from SEO. Starting from zero, I had over 300,000 unique visitors per month. I sold my affiliate blog 2018 for $6M.

My blog exist since 2018. It gets about a 100 new traffic every month. I have about 3 spammy links I've ask Google to delete. (I can't remember the term for it)

I have about 50 blog post and only 10 are about 3k words.

I rarely do on page SEO and I think my site map is warp after yoast interfere.

My keyword is forex price action trading. My question is.

What's the first step to increase blog traffic?
1. Increase blog post? (I write once a month for 2k and above words or 500 once a week for trading analysis)

2. Start getting a stand alone host as I'm on shared.

3. Write guest post to build links?

4. Unplug plug ins. It is slowly my website down.

 

[lludwig]

My blog exist since 2018. It gets about a 100 new traffic every month. I have about 3 spammy links I've ask Google to delete. (I can't remember the term for it)

I have about 50 blog post and only 10 are about 3k words.

I rarely do on page SEO and I think my site map is warp after yoast interfere.

My keyword is forex price action trading. My question is.

What's the first step to increase blog traffic?
1. Increase blog post? (I write once a month for 2k and above words or 500 once a week for trading analysis)

2. Start getting a stand alone host as I'm on shared.

3. Write guest post to build links?

4. Unplug plug ins. It is slowly my website down.

1. but also improve the existing articles.

Improve user experience. Make sure it looks professional, without a lot of poups and distractions.

 

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[seriousleisure]

ahrefs.com has some good content.
detailed.com
SEO Signals Lab

The last is more filled with SEO professionals though.

Thanks for this info! These sites are very informative.
I have a physical product site in a very competitive niche and will be rebuilding my website as well as doing SEO.

 

[PaulNash]

First of all, well done. It looks like you're indeed a Seo specialist. I have only basic knowledge in this but I really like this area and somehow I always find my self learning something new about this. Can you share more of your techniques and methods and how do you reach 300,000 visitors per month? As for me, this is more than great but it also looks hard to obtain, so I would like to know more about that. Also, it's surprising to me that you could earn $6M from selling your affiliate blog. Looking forward to your recommendations for a beginner that is open to learning more.

 

[puckman]

First of all, well done. It looks like you're indeed a Seo specialist. I have only basic knowledge in this but I really like this area and somehow I always find my self learning something new about this. Can you share more of your techniques and methods and how do you reach 300,000 visitors per month? As for me, this is more than great but it also looks hard to obtain, so I would like to know more about that. Also, it's surprising to me that you could earn $6M from selling your affiliate blog. Looking forward to your recommendations for a beginner that is open to learning more.

One traffic trick I like to do is write about experts or journalists. An article on your site like "The Top Experts in Remote Working", or "The top experts reporting on personal finance", etc. After you write the article and post it, tweet the article and tag the experts on Twitter. Most will love the free attention and retweet it or reply on Twitter. If the experts/journalists have big audiences, it can drive new visits. Its not necessarily evergreen SEO, but it shows you how a well written article can generate traffic.

 

[lludwig]

One traffic trick I like to do is write about experts or journalists. An article on your site like "The Top Experts in Remote Working", or "The top experts reporting on personal finance", etc. After you write the article and post it, tweet the article and tag the experts on Twitter. Most will love the free attention and retweet it or reply on Twitter. If the experts/journalists have big audiences, it can drive new visits. Its not necessarily evergreen SEO, but it shows you how a well written article can generate traffic.

This isn't a bad backlink strategy.

 

[lludwig]

First of all, well done. It looks like you're indeed a Seo specialist. I have only basic knowledge in this but I really like this area and somehow I always find my self learning something new about this. Can you share more of your techniques and methods and how do you reach 300,000 visitors per month? As for me, this is more than great but it also looks hard to obtain, so I would like to know more about that. Also, it's surprising to me that you could earn $6M from selling your affiliate blog. Looking forward to your recommendations for a beginner that is open to learning more.

This is way too broad of a question to answer. I would need to know what help you want.

 

[juicey]

Hi Larry. I would love your insight and thoughts on the following e-commerce SEO matter:
Home page and a category page (example: floor tiles) both rank on the top of page 2 in search, when you search for the keyword "floor tiles".

My theory is that they might be competing against each other and the category page could get better rankings if I would use more links directing from the home page to the category pages (there are other categories that have a similar situation).

The home page doesn't contain the keyword "floor tiles" except just on the categories menu.
What are your initial thoughts on this?

 

[lludwig]

Hi Larry. I would love your insight and thoughts on the following e-commerce SEO matter:
Home page and a category page (example: floor tiles) both rank on the top of page 2 in search, when you search for the keyword "floor tiles".

My theory is that they might be competing against each other and the category page could get better rankings if I would use more links directing from the home page to the category pages (there are other categories that have a similar situation).

The home page doesn't contain the keyword "floor tiles" except just on the categories menu.
What are your initial thoughts on this?

If it's one thing that the brand sells, then yes it should be a sub-page/folder in your site. Though keep in mind your brand represents what niche/categories it is in as well as what it is not. So it possible to make the home page represent a niche in some form. Though ideally, it's not as actionable as a sub folder. So work on your category page and make it "beefier" and add more content and perhaps other ways to engage the visitor.

 

[AdrianB]

I am looking for the best SEO course in 2020 for ranking on first page in Google by main keywords. Do you have any recommendation?
Thank you

 

[lludwig]

I am looking for the best SEO course in 2020 for ranking on first page in Google by main keywords. Do you have any recommendation?
Thank you

I'm somewhat biased and will say my own course.

Learn to Write Google-Ranking Content

Taught by a 20+ year expert in an easy-to-understand format that demystifies the "black box" of SEO.

welcome.larryludwig.com