Udaipur City | Lakecity Ventures

Udaipur is believed to be one of the most romantic city in India, Beside shimmering lake pichola and purple ridges fo the wooded Aravlli Hills Udaipur is of of the Zindadil City in India. Here we present business and local travel guide containing information on Udaipur, a cultural and historical city of Rajasthan state of India. Get information of shopping, travel, hotels, restaurants, gyms, spa, shops, malls, shopping centers, news and events of Udaipur with single click. To get latest updates and information about udaipur visit :- www.udaipur.ind.in and stay up to date with your lakecity.

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5 Blogging Tips That Help Drive Traffic To Your Site

If you are a good writer, have you thought about becoming a blogger!

The great thing about blogging is that you can select any topic that you want and preferably have experience in, and create your own blog for free. Not only that, but blogging is a great way of making money by writing good quality articles and write ups that people want to read.

But before you get carried away, making a blog and writing a couple of articles will not suffice, you need to spend time attracting readers and building traffic to your blog. There are plenty of ways to do this, but many of you just starting out will want quick and cost effective methods to get you going.

The following are the top five blogging tips which help to drive traffic to your blog. Let’s look on these five tips:

1. Write Regular, Good Quality Posts

One of the best tips that you need to abide by, is to write high quality, useful content on a regular basis. This is the first step in building your blog’s readership. Make sure you come up with something meaningful for your readers and contribute on a regular basis to retain their interest and help them stay loyal to you. Not only that, but posting on a regular basis, with new and interesting content, helps to make your blog SEO friendly.

2. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

If you are planning to make money with your blog, you need to make sure that your site is properly optimized for the search engines by using SEO techniques. This helps to increase the number of hits to your blog, and generally make your site more visible on the popular search engines.

Many bloggers understand the significance of SEO, however, some end up spending a huge amount of money on some expensive tool that they really don’t need. Remember, SEO can be implemented easily without investing much. If fact, there are some free SEO tools provided by Google that are very useful. You can try the Google AdWords keyword tool to research specific keywords to include in your articles and help improve your SEO ranking.

3. Use The Power Of Blog Comments

Blog comments are one of the best ways to help increase traffic to your blog.

Firstly, you need to be replying to peoples comments that are left on your site to help make your readers feel valued and open up a two way communication. This helps to improve reader loyalty and grow a community around your website that people want to be a part of.

Secondly, commenting on other peoples blogs can help to drive new traffic back to your own site. When you leave a comment on someones site, you can leave a link to your blog’s URL (backlink) which people can click on. Many of the visitors will read your comments and if they find it valuable or helpful in some way, they can simply visit your blog through the link that you left. This is why it’s SO important to make sure you leave a meaningful/interesting comment.

4. Create An Attractive Site

Blogs are primarily valued on quality content rather than any visual aspect, however, if you use proper visual themes and images, you can add value to your site and make it more appealing to visitors.

You don’t necessarily need to pay for a premium WordPress theme, but try out a good quality theme from hundreds of the free themes that are available online. Try to find one that shows off your content in the maximum way possible to your visitors. Think about how they interact with your articles, is it easy to find relevant posts, is everything easy to read, etc. Failure to think about this can put off a lot of people viewing your site, which ultimately can result in you loosing money!

Also, think of including good quality images in your blog posts. There are plenty of copyright free images that can be found on sites like iStockPhoto or Flickr. Just remember to give the image owners proper credit and a link to the original source.

5. Use RSS Feeds

RSS feeds can be an effective way getting people back to your blog. Set up an RSS feed button on your blog and let people sign up to receive regular updates about your website. This way, they will always be up to date with what is happening on your site.

Blogging can be a great way of making money online, provided you can produce good quality content on a regular basis. All you need to do is to select a topic of your expertise and start writing. But to be truly successful, you need market your site to attract new readers and drive traffic.

So, what do you think? What other tips would you advise new bloggers to follow to help them attract more traffic? Please leave your comments below.

Guest Blogging Tips – How To Pitch A Guest Post

As you are reading this, I know that you are interested in making money online. You’re interested in increasing the number of followers you have, you want clients, you want subscribers, and perhaps you’re selling an e-book. No matter your specific end goal, right now you want to figure out how you can connect with influencers and specific bloggers to help you magnify your voice and/or brand.  Well one of the best ways is to use guest blogging tips and write for other sites.

Guest blogging is a great way to promote yourself and your website, but before you worry about how you’re going to benefit, you must consider the wants and needs of the person/site you will be pitching your guest post to. Aligning your brand strategies and complementing what those bloggers hope to achieve will leverage the biggest return on investment for everyone involved.  By adding value and credibility to their blog, each person in the relationship wins.

Here are 4 guest blogging tips to help you pitch a guest post for you to consider:

4 Guest Blogging Tips

1. Target Your Guest Post At The Right People

Be smart from the get-go. If your blog/product is about “Self-Help”, don’t contact a blogger who is known primarily for “Dog Grooming”. An off-topic pitch will sink you quicker than you can say “outreach fail.”

Also, your initial approach when reaching out to a registered nurse or teacher, for example, will be different than if you’re contacting someone who owns a marketing blog and is business-savvy — they’re motivated by different things. A nurse is dedicated to improving patient outcomes and teachers want to make an impact on the next generation, so your pitch should outline how what you have to offer them helps achieve those goals.

A marketing blogger, on the other hand, might be more driven by how collaborating with you will elevate their visibility and draw more traffic to their site. Further, a mommy blogger will be interested in “lessons learned”-type content, as well as how a particular product may help ease some of the challenges associated with parenting.

2. Know Who You Are Pitching To

 

Mass emails are spammy and repellent, don’t send them. Any blogger who has reached a modicum of success will see through a boilerplate message of “Hi, I want to use your forum to launch my own business!”  There is nothing wrong with reaching out and emailing bloggers, but there is a right way and a wrong way to go about it.

Take the time to research each blogger’s strengths, voice and areas of influence. Does your voice complement or clash with his or her voice? Some bloggers prefer to have a harmonious tone to their online voice; others like to have a lively discourse and forum where lots of ideas are presented. Define whether or not if there is an underlying theme, motif or perspective that informs the blogger’s voice, and be sure what you’re offering them works with that.

3. Follow Submission Guidelines

Most bloggers have a specific section that states their parameters for submissions, so it’s simply common courtesy to honour them. Have your ducks in a row as it relates not only to your post, but your author bio, photo and other elements specifically defined.

Some bloggers explicitly state that they’re not interested in pitches of any kind. Some allow you to include external links in contributed copy, some don’t. Other blogs might be a little more lenient when it comes to soft selling yourself or the brand you represent in your writing. Make it your business to read any guidelines they’ve outlined, and if there aren’t any, ask for specifics.

Check out some of the things you should NOT do in our ‘How Not To Get Your Guest Post Published‘ guide.

4. Comment On Their Content

Without necessarily becoming the blogger’s No. 1 fan, do simple things to show some appreciation. Follow him or her on Twitter. If (s)he has a Facebook page, like it. Engage them by re-tweeting content or messaging them. Ask them what their favourite moment was at the recent 140edu conference they attended, or what they thought about The New York Times article that weighed the pros and cons of new technology in the field of medicine. Simply put: get involved.

Take the time to read their stuff. Comment where relevant without promoting yourself. Thoughtful, insightful comments will get you on the blogger’s radar and will, hopefully, remind him/her of your interest when you do eventually pitch them. Engaging their community will pave the way for you to ask, and make it easier for them to say yes.

Have you used some of these guest blogging tips successfully?  What other guest blogging tips would you recommend?  Please let us know by leaving a comment below!

70 Tips On How To Be A Better Blogger!

Do you want to be a better blogger?

I have noticed that the most successful bloggers online all take similar steps to becoming great bloggers. There is no magic secret that they use to be successful, they all just use they same tips and techniques that work.

Anyone can become a successful blogger, you just need to know what you are doing. This is why I have put this simple list together. This lengthy list highlights some of the more important points to concentrate on whilst growing your blog. Not all of these points need to be accomplished, and there is no specific order that they need to be done in.

Here are my 70 tips on becoming a better blogger…

General Tips

1. Domain Name – Get yourself your own Domain Name! Having your own domain name (e.g. YourBlog.com) is infinitely better than having a rubbish free one (e.g. ‘YourBlog.Blogspot.com’). Not only will it look more professional, but you will attract much more traffic. The best domain names are descriptive of what your website is about, for example ‘xyz.com’ is about teaching people how to make money online. It only costs about $10 to register a domain for a whole year. I used GoDaddy to register my website domains and I’ve never had a problem with them.

2. Website Hosting – Host your site with a professional Hosting company! I know what you’re thinking… “I can’t afford a website at the moment and why should I have to pay when there are sites like Blogger.com?”  The truth is, you never really own your content with free hosting sites and it could be taken away in an instant. All your hard work will be gone and you have absolutely no control. Search engines often ignore these sites all together and visitors may doubt your credibility! You get much more control over your website by using a professional hosting company and it looks a lot better to your site visitors. I use HostGator to host my sites. It only costs me about $4 a month, which is a bargain because you easily make that back with your site once it is up and running!

3. WordPress – You’re using WordPress for your blog, aren’t you? WordPress is the best blogging platform available to use to manage your blog site, and best of all it’s completely FREE!

4. WordPress Theme – Use a good quality WordPress theme! Sites like WooThemes & StudioPress offer high quality WordPress themes to its users. This makes your site look and feel more professional to your readers, which will cause them to trust you more. People do judge a book by its cover, so having a sharp looking website helps readers stick around for longer.

5. Publish blog posts regularly!

6. Spend time creating unique, quality blog content! Content is King after all.

7. Use Google Analytics! Track your site progress and see where you need to improve. Check out our beginners guide to Analytics.

8. Give your blog it’s own unique voice… You! People are going to be reading what YOU write, so make sure that it is interesting and different in some way to the competition.

9. Build relationships with your readers! Let your readers see the REAL you. Blogging is more personal than conventional websites. Be honest and share a few stories from your own life. By being real and personal, you will build a relationship with your readers based on loyalty and trust.

10. Persistence is the key! Give your blog at least 6 months before you start expecting great returns on all of your hard work. Believe me, it will pay off in the long run!

11. Ask your visitors for suggestions! They can help you to improve your website content, because at the end of the day, it’s all about your readers.

12. Look out for trends within your niche!

13. Write about something that you love! If you don’t enjoy the subject that you are writing about, you will not put the required effort in to succeed.

14. Have fun! Blogging doesn’t always have to be serious. Feel free to make your posts fun and entertaining.

Pages You Should Have

15. Include an “About Us” page! Think of this page as an advert for your site. Sell yourself, your qualities, past experiences, information about you, your story and how you got started. The better this page is, the more likely people are to trust what you are writing about.

16. Make a Subscription Page!

17. Make a Confirmation Page! People will be redirected back to your site to the confirmation page, after they subscribe.

18. Create Comparison Pages! When you are promoting a certain product on your website, it can be beneficial to create a comparison page that lists other products that are similar. People like to shop around to find the best deal, so if you can let them do that whilst on your website it will benefit you.

19. Let people contact you via a Contact Page! Provide a clear page that lists all of the ways that readers can get in contact with you to ask you questions, seek advice, etc.

20. Provide an Advertising Space Page! If you offer advertising space on your website, then you will need a page detailing how someone would go about securing it.

21. Make an Earnings Disclaimer Page! If you are one of these people that talks about money and how much they are earning, then you need to provide an earnings disclaimer page. This is just to stop you from getting into trouble.

22. Provide an FAQ Page for your readers! You will find that people tend to ask the same sort of questions repeatedly. Having an FAQ page that helps to answer these questions is very helpful for people.

23. Make Category Pages! I split my posts up into different categories and created a page for each; writing, making money, traffic, etc. This way, people that are only interested in the making money posts can easily find them, without having to search through all of my posts.

24. Create a Product List Page! The aim of this page is to display all of your recommended and highest converting products to your visitors. This way, they can easily see the things that you use, which can encourage them to invest in them themselves.

25. Create a customized 404 page!

Blog Content Tips

26. Write with your reader in mind! Imagine that you are chatting with them over lunch. Write as though they are sat right in front of you and stay away from over the top technical terms.

27. Learn to write great headlines!

28. Create Top Lists! e.g. Top 50 Earning Blogs, Top 50 Valued Websites, etc.

29. Use numbers in your titles to attract attention! e.g. 10 Steps To Write Amazing Content, 6 Unique Website Content Ideas, 8 Ways To Improve Your Blog Writing, etc.

30. Create a “How To” articles! e.g. How To Successfully Monetize Your Blog, How To Blog For Money, etc.

31. Use Images within each of your blog posts!

32. Edit your posts ruthlessly! Bad spelling & grammar are one of the easiest ways of putting people off.

33. Turn your articles into podcasts!

34. Turn your articles into videos using PowerPoint to create an entertaining slide show. Submit your video to all of the popular video sites, such as YouTube and Vimeo.

35. Turn your articles into downloadable PDFs/ebooks.

36. Use Infographics!

Getting Traffic To Your Site

37. Submit your site to blog directories!

38. Submit to blog carnivals!

39. Use Email Marketing! Encourage people back to your site by promoting your latest post/promotion/competition.

40. Sign up to Google+! Attract traffic to your blog with Google Plus.

41. Sign up to LinkedIn! Build your business with LinkedIn and drive traffic to your site.

42. Sign up to Twitter! Use Twitter to promote your site.

43. Create a Facebook Page! Make a profitable Facebook Fan Page and promote your blog.

44. Sign up for Feedburner! Let readers subscribe to your RSS feed on your site. A good way to do this is to place an RSS feed link at the bottom of every post.

45. Use On-Page SEO Techniques & Off-Page SEO Techniques to improve your rankings on search engine results pages (SERPs)!

46. Use internal linking within your posts!

47. Optimise your pages & posts using targeted Google keywords!

48. Get involved in the blogging community! Being a blogger is about being part of a larger community. Leave comments and post links to other peoples blogs and get to know your favourite bloggers.

49. Encourage social media sharing & bookmarking! You should make sure to include social media links before and after each post, which allow readers to share what they have read with other people via Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc.

50. Install Google XML Sitemaps plug-in! This plug-in will enable you to automatically generate a Google sitemap for your blog.

51. Become a Guest Blogger! Write guest post articles for other blogs. This helps to spread the word about you and your site to other people that will be interested.

52. Invite your readers to submit guest post articles to your site!

53. Conduct interviews with industry experts/other bloggers within your niche! This is one of the best ways to create original, engaging content.

54. Translate your site into multiple languages! This is one tactic that few sites are taking advantage of. Simply installing a plug-in that allows translation of your pages is a great way of attracting more traffic.

55. Submit exclusive content to high-profile sites.

Top Ways To Monetize Your Blog

56. Pick a profitable niche to blog about! Learn how to select a blog topic that makes the most money.

57. Treat your blog like a business!

58. Passive Income!

59. Recursive Income!

60. Affiliate Marketing!

61. Google Adsense!

62. Product Reviews!

63. Make & sell your own product!

64. Write an ebook!

65. Membership site!

66. Email Marketing!

67. Job Boards!

68. Donations!

69. Sell your Website!

70. Read ‘30 Ways Your Website Can Earn You Money!‘
I hope you’ve found this list helpful.  Please leave any comments below.

15 Reasons Why Your Business Can’t Live Without Google

Many people have varying opinions on Google.  Some feel that it is abhorrently evil, whereas others absolutely love it.  People are divided even further, however, when Google has an effect on their livelihood.  This tends to always raise the question of whether you can live without Google or not.

There are many online businesses and websites that rely heavily on Google, in fact I get to speak to many website owners who are in this situation.  I have had a few people get in touch with me who are angry that “Google has killed my business” and vow to turn their back on it forever.   Perhaps you have had a similar experience, but whatever your feelings are towards it unfortunately your business can’t live without Google.

Personally, I am somewhere in the middle area when it comes to my views on Google.  At times I worry about the monopoly that it has over the internet and the huge influence that it has, however as a website owner I value the tools and global reach that it can give.

There is no real point in trying to fight against Google as you will inevitably lose.  What you can do though is work with it (and its vast array of tools) to help promote your online business.  That is why I decided to put together this list of reasons why your business can’t live without Google.

1. Google Search Traffic

Whilst Bing, Yahoo and other search engines are great, nothing comes close to the huge behemoth that is Google.  Approximately 65-70% of all global internet searchers are done via the Google search engine.

What does this mean?  Well simply that if your online business intends to drive traffic, it needs to make the most of Google.  That is where the vast majority of people are coming from, so why fight against it.

Admittedly, even if you do everything that Google says, things can go wrong when they make updates to their search settings.  This can cause huge variations in traffic (i.e. the Penguin update cause many sites to lose lots of traffic), but unfortunately you just have to grin and bear it.  If future updates do have a knock on effect on your site, try not to be angry (as that will get you nowhere), instead just work towards fixing the issues.  Believe me, this has happened to one of my sites and the only thing that helped was to work WITH Google.

2. Google Analytics Data

Since Google is used by the vast majority of people, it provides the most accurate traffic statistics.  There are many other alternative analytics programs and website data services that you could use, such as; Alexa, Open Site Explorer, Piwik, Parsely and many, many more.

One HUGE advantage that Google Analytics has over many of its competitors is that it can link in with other Google services (most of which are listed below) that help give you a better insight to how your website is performing.

I wouldn’t recommend that you rely solely on Google Analytics, as it helps to have more than one way to assess your site, but I would definitely suggest that it is a tool that you absolutely can’t live without.

3. Google Webmaster Tools

If Google Analytics is focused on the performance of your website, then Google Webmaster Tools is focused on the health of it.
Essentially it allows you to keep track of things like;

• Crawl errors,
• Crawl Stats,
• Malware,
• Sitemap stats,
• HTML Improvements,
• Site speed,
• …and much more.

Check out our beginners guide to Google Webmaster Tools for more information and watch the video below.

4. YouTube

We have already established that Google is the biggest search engine online, but what would you guess is the second biggest?  Bing?  Yahoo?  Baidu?  Nope, it’s none of those.  It is actually YouTube!

OK, so technically YouTube is not a search engine, but in terms of the number of daily searches made, YouTube outdoes all of the other search engines.  This is one of the main reasons why Google paid $1.65 billion for it back in 2006, which is a bargain for what it is probably worth now.

What does this mean for your online business?  Well, there is a HUGE source of traffic to utilize by introducing video to your marketing strategy.  Not only can people find you via the normal search engine, but they can find you via videos on YouTube that you have uploaded that point back to your main site.  What is even better is that you can embed your videos onto your main site as well, so people can watch them there.

There are many types of videos that you can create for your site, the point is that it helps to market your business.  You can even earn money from your videos via YouTube’s partner program.  In fact some individuals have been able to ditch their jobs and work full time online making YouTube videos, so it is well worth doing.

5. Google Keyword Planner

In order to make the most use of Google to send traffic your way, you need to figure out what people are searching for online.  This is where the keyword planner tool comes in, as it allows you to search for popular keywords and keyphrases that are being used.

This allows you to create content, whether that is in the form of a blog post, a YouTube video, a slideshow, etc. that will help to attract traffic.  Your time is precious, so spending that time creating content that has a good chance of being found is infinitely better than creating content that has little or no chance of people finding it.

This is definitely a tool that you need to start using!

6. Google Trends

Google trends is quite similar to the keyword planner tool, in the fact that you can find what people are searching for online.  The main difference though is that Google Trends focuses on what people are searching for right now and how popular that search term has changed over time.
This is not only great for (again) targeting your content for people, but also finding what people are searching for within your niche.  It can also be great for choosing a website niche in the first place, as then you know what sort of size your target audience is.

7. Google+

Facebook and Twitter tend to grab all the headlines, but Google+ is arguably the most important and influential search engine around at the moment.  You could say that it is still in its infancy, but it is, without doubt, growing very quickly.
What makes it so influential is the fact that it is linked with Google’s other products, particularly its search engine.  You can now find listings that your Google+ friends have shared in the past or see your friends/colleagues posts in the SERPs when you wouldn’t normally.

Google authorship is also closely linked to Google+, allowing a small picture to appear next to your content in the SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages).  This has been proved to increase the clickthrough rate to websites that have this enabled, making it even more important that you set yours up.

You can also setup individual Google+ pages for your business.  Not only is this another way for people to find you online, but it also provides additional information next to your main site listing on Google.

8. Google Maps

If you want to find where a place is, where do you tend to go first?  Google maps is the go-to place for the vast majority of people online.

Again, where Google maps differs to many of its competitors is that it is linked with the other Google tools/services.  When you search for a place, not only will you find where it is, you will get (or at least if it is setup properly);

• A link to their website,
• Address,
• Phone Number,
• Google+ link,
• Photos,
• Street view,
• Reviews,
• Directions,

If you are a business with a physical location, you cannot neglect Google maps.  It is simply a service that you MUST use in order for people to find you.

9. Google AdWords

A key way of attracting more people to your website is by advertising online.  Now whilst you can attract lots of people by advertising on specific sites or even offline, one of the best is to advertise on Google itself.  This is done by using AdWords.

I would explain how the whole process works, but it is much easier if you just watch the video below that describes how it all works.

10. Google Translate

Whilst there are a lot of people in the world that speak and read English, there are many more who don’t.  The greatest thing about the internet is that it has made the whole world smaller.  People from all corners of the world can find your website with a few clicks, but that doesn’t mean that they can understand everything.

This is where Google translate comes in.  It is by far the most used translation tool online, making it simple for people of other nationalities to read your content.  If people use Google Chrome (more on that later) then that translation process is done automatically when a website is opened.  Even if you use another browser, you can install the Google translate app/extension and that will work also.  You can even install an app/button on your website itself, allowing people to translate your site when they land on it.

This Google tool is one that you don’t really need to worry about, though arguably it is one of the most important ones.  This very site attracts readers from every continent in the world (which is amazing!), so I owe a lot to the translate tool.

11. Android

Android devices account for approximately 75% of the global smartphone/tablet market.  Since mobile internet usage is dramatically increasing, it is vitally important that websites are “mobile friendly” for people to view whilst on the go.

The Google Play store is also one of the largest mobile app stores online, meaning that if your business intends to make its mark within the app market, it needs to do so for Android devices.  The Apple store for iPhone/iPad users and Windows app store are equally as important, but since Android holds such a hold on the market you can’t afford to neglect them.

12. Google Hangouts

More and more people are making use of video calls (or video conferencing) to connect with other people.  Not only is this great to keep in touch with distant family members, but it is also a good way to connect with clients, business contacts and colleagues.

Skype is currently the market leader in this field, but Google Hangouts isn’t far behind.  Google’s smart move was to link it up with YouTube, allowing people to record and publish their video conversations to their YouTube channels for free.  This is great for businesses as they can easily record video conferences and interviews to share with their wider community.

13. Google AdSense

There are many different ways to monetize a website, advertising is just one method that you can use.  AdSense can be a good choice for many sites, though affiliate marketing and banner advertising are just as, if not better alternatives.
What AdSense can offer though is targeted adverts that fit in with your other content.  This can encourage people to click on them more, which in turn helps to increase your revenue.

14. Google Drive

Cloud storage is a very competitive industry at the moment, what with companies like Dropbox, Amazon Cloud Drive, Box, Microsoft OneDrive and Apple iCloud, to name a few, all competing for the same people.

Google Drive is one of the most widely used cloud storage services, simply because it makes it easy to store and share all of your documents between all of your different devices.  This makes it perfect for businesses as they can share files between different people.

Google drive works seamlessly between Gmail, Google Docs, Google+, Android and other Google tools, making it simple to access what you are after.

15. Google Chrome

If you run a website you will know how important it is to test to see whether everything works across multiple browsers.  Since Google Chrome is arguably the most widely used browser online, it pays to make sure that it works perfectly on there first.

Google Chrome also features on their Android system, making it all the more important that you test your site to see if everything functions correctly.

So Can Your Business Live Without Google?

Google is being incredibly smart by building and linking all of their tools and services together to create a gigantic network.   Arguably though, it is because of this huge network that so many people are concerned about Google’s hold on the internet.

Whatever your personal views are about Google as a company, it is this network that is the reason why you should be working WITH Google and not against them, as you wouldn’t get very far without it.   It allows you to reach the most people online, with the greatest ease, with the best integrated tools at your disposal.  At the end of the day, it makes good business sense.

What are your views on Google as a whole?  Which Google tools/services could you not live without?  We want to hear your views, so please get in touch below via the comment system.

How To Drive Traffic With Targeted Google Keywords

Getting traffic to your blog is vitally important for the success of your website. By far the best way of driving traffic is to get your web pages ranking highly on search engine results pages (SERPs), such as Google or Bing.

To achieve this, you need to be including targeted keywords in your blog posts & articles, so that people can find your site through search engines when they are looking for relevant information.

What Are Keywords?

When you are searching for information on the web, you use a search engine like Google. You do this by typing in some words describing what they are looking for, whether that is in a sentence (e.g. – How to improve SEO on my website?), or just a few words (e.g. – How to SEO).

The search engine checks its database to look for all the relevant pages online that include the words that you searched for, and displays the results that best match what you are looking for.

These words that people use to search with are called ‘Keywords‘ or ‘Search Terms‘.

Now, you will know that when you only use a single key word in a search engine, you will generate results that are very broad and generally totally irrelevant! To fine-tune a web search, you need to use a number of words or a phrase. This helps the search engine to find more relevant information that will be of use for you.

Why are Keywords important?

Keywords are important because you can include them within your blog posts. If you make sure that you include lots of relevant keywords within your web pages, then people will be able to find your page easier when searching on Google or Bing. This is a really easy and free way to drive targeted traffic to your website.

What Keywords Should You Use To Get Website Traffic?

One of the first things that you should do when you sit down to write a blog post, is to find out what the relevant keywords are. You need to know what words, phrases, search terms that people are using to search for relevant information.

For example, I may want to write a blog post on something to do with improving website SEO. I would use a keyword tool to search for all the relevant keywords and phrases that I could use within that blog post. This way, when I actually write it, I can include all of these relevant keywords to help my post rank higher on SERPs and be found by people on search engines more easily.

Keyword Tool Research

I use the ‘Google Keyword Tool‘ to research all of my keywords. You can find this great tool within your own Google AdWords account, under the ‘Reporting & Tools’ tab.

Now, I will have a general idea of the topic that I am going to write about for my latest post, which means I will also have a general idea of the Keywords that I can use. Within the ‘Google Keyword Tool‘ you can enter in words or phrases that you want to search for. So, if I use the previous example of “improving website SEO” I would enter in; SEO, improve website SEO, website traffic, etc.

Google will search to find the information related to these keywords. The first column ‘Competition‘ shows literally how much keyword competition there is. The higher the rating, the more pages there are online that use that keyword, so try to use keywords/phrases that have LOW ‘Competition’, so your page will rank higher!

The next two columns, ‘Global Monthly Searches‘ & ‘Local Monthly Searches‘ show how many monthly searches that are conducted with those specific keywords. Mine are the same because I have selected ‘Location: All’, but you could search for results for a certain country, such as ‘Location: UK’ or ‘Location: Canada’ depending on your website audience. The higher these values are, the better. You want lots of people searching for the keywords that you choose because they are the potential audience that you are writing for. This is why I have discounted the keyword, ‘improve website SEO’ because it has such a small global monthly search value.

So, to summarize. You want to find Keywords with LOW ‘Competition’ and HIGH ‘Global Monthly Searches’/’Local Monthly Searches’. The more people that are searching for your keywords and the less competition those Keywords have from other web pages, the more likely your web page/blog post will be found. This will help drive traffic to your site!

Google will also display all of the Keywords that it believes are relevant, based on the ones that you previously entered. Here you can search through and find the ones that are of most use to you, to use within your post.

From the image above, you can see that the one I am most interested in is, “what is SEO” because it has relatively LOW competition and very HIGH global monthly searches. I would continue selecting a handful of keywords that I could use within my post based on LOW ‘Competition’ and HIGH ‘Global Monthly Searches’/’Local Monthly Searches’.

How To Use Targeted Keywords Within Web Pages/Blog Posts

Now that you have a selection of targeted keywords to use, how do you use them to get more traffic? Well, we implement them using On-Page SEO techniques.

Use your targeted keywords within your;

• Page Titles
• Meta-Descriptions
• URL Structure
• Body Tags
• Image SEO
• Bold & Italic Tags

Using these On-Page SEO techniques and including your keywords within them, helps search engines to more accurately identify what information is on your web page. If they can more accurately assess what your page is about, then they can suggest it to more people when it is searched for.

Simply put, you are making it easier for people to find your website, which will help to drive traffic to your site. Just remember; Keywords should have LOW competition and HIGH monthly searches!

Anyway, I hope you have found this post useful. Please leave any comments below.

Google Plus SEO: Is Your Business Reaping The Rewards?

If you or your business aren’t taking advantage of Google’s own social network ‘Google Plus’, then perhaps now is the time for you to take a closer look.

Google Plus is a relatively new addition to the social media market, having launched only two years ago. As of December 2012 it now has over 500 million registered users!  Google Plus, (also referred to as ‘Google+’ or ‘G+’), separates itself from the likes of Facebook and Twitter, being accessed by an overarching layer on your browser, within the Google search engine and integrated within your Gmail account.

If you have a Gmail account, then you automatically have a Google Plus profile set up for you, so it may be a case of taking advantage of what you have rather than setting up an account.

Google Plus Is Good For SEO

If gaining access to around half a billion users isn’t incentive enough, then it’s worth considering that Google is now integrating Google Plus presence as an SEO ranking factor.

Due to Google’s dominance over the search engine market, it can determine what factors contribute to its SERP rankings.

In recent years Google has begun to integrate and use social media activity as an important ranking factor for websites.  Having an active social networking presence acts as a signal that your website shares interesting and useful information with others, which will then help boost your rankings.

It’s hardly surprising that Google is now shifting the focus on to its own social network, the amount of +1’s a site has is now calibrated in Google’s own ranking algorithms. It makes perfect sense from Google’s perspective to increase the importance of its own social networking site ahead of its other competitors.

“Within search results, information tied to verified online profiles will be ranked higher than content without such verification, which will result in most users naturally clicking on the top (verified) results. The true cost of remaining anonymous, then, might be irrelevance.”  – Erik Schmidt, Executive Chairman of Google.

The focus on Google Plus is likely to increase in the coming years as Google is effectively attempting to monopolize the entire web market, including social networking, that has recently been dominated by the likes of Facebook and Twitter.

How Can Businesses Take Advantage?

This is the question that many businesses and bloggers alike will be asking, and the answer is relatively simple.  All you have to do is improve or develop your presence on Google plus.

Gmail has more users than any other web-based mail service (including the likes of AOL and Hotmail).  By clicking the ‘+You’ sign you’ll be transferred to your Google Plus account, which is likely to be somewhat dormant if you haven’t used the service before.


When you’ve established a presence on Google Plus the process is pretty straight forward, undertaking a social media marketing campaign often consumes valuable time and resources but through doing so you could actively improve your site’s ranking.

It’s worth mentioning that you could also theoretically let your followers do the work for you, simply by having a Google Plus account and having G+ buttons on your site or blog, your followers can increase your presence on the site. The amount of pluses you have is counted and monitored by Google, essentially its encouraging you to share information through its own social networking service, rather than through its competitors.

There is even Google Plus Local which can help get more people to see your local business.

Aside from the potential SEO benefits, Google+ does have other “plus” points (if you enjoy a pun).

Google Authorship 

Google Authorship is one of the fundamental benefits of using Google plus, particularly for bloggers. By linking your information to your Google+ account (via HTML tagging) Google can add a picture to your information on its own SERP ranking, this may seem like a minuscule addition but research has shown that it can increase your Click Through Rate by around 20%.


Check out our ‘Google Authorship Guide‘ to see how to get started and get your picture in the search results.

Google Communities

Google Plus is tailored towards individuals and businesses, it’s more business orientated than Facebook and more informal than the likes of Linkedin. One of the best ways to target an audience and other businesses that share the same interests is through the Google Communities service, users are encouraged to share and discuss relevant information through this service.  It’s a bit like Facebook groups, but a lot more visual.