Keywords and serps

[Dazza30]

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Can someone please give me some advice!

I have been reading everything i can and asking questions about seo for a while now and ive managed to get my site indexed and showing in the serps.

Currently ive found 40 keywords for which my site shows, with about 12 being targeted for my home page and the rest for other pages.


What i want to know is, does page rank effect keyword ranking? and should i expect traffic to increase?

Ive been under the illusion that if you can get a site appearing in the top 30 for various keywords the traffic will come.

[cclayton]

What i want to know is, does page rank effect keyword ranking? and should i expect traffic to increase?

As far as I am concerned, Page Rank does not effect keyword ranking. Page Rank has the ability to divert you off of what really matters and that is good content, with some regular keyword expression and also Link Building with your keywords as the anchor. I have found link building to be the best method of getting your site ranked well in the search engines.

Ive been under the illusion that if you can get a site appearing in the top 30 for various keywords the traffic will come.

It depends on traffic volumes of searches for those keywords, generally I would always aim to be in the top 4. I dont think being 30th will see you get much traffic at all... you need to be on the first page in my opinion to be worthwhile and if you get to the first page then why not go for the top and get the most you can!

Good luck, its hard work but rewarding. I have been working on one of my sites for over 6 months and have just got to number 4 in google for the keyword I am focussing on and am continuing to work on it so that by next year I am number one.

[Dazza30]

Thanks for the reply, i started working with seo as i was learning it and have since realised, im showing up for obscure terms like [phones with a gift] for which im 4th out of 62.000.000 but that doesnt gurantee ill get any traffic.

The problem with the mobile market is its very competitive and ive had to choose keywords i thought i could compete on, like [free gift deals] for which im currently 6th in the world, but i dont receive that much traffic from it.

Ive learnt how to apply seo to a page but when it comes to choosing keywords that arnt too competitive but receive visits i come unstuck.

[tbp]

im 4th out of 62.000.000 but that doesnt gurantee ill get any traffic

This is very true unfortunately. In searches like that above there aren't really 62 million results, google starts by showing the most relevant, and then the revelance decreases down from that. As a result, although it says theres 62 million results, there could only be 20 "real" results, the rest are just fillers. It is possible though to get good commissions on low amounts of traffic if your site converts well. I would look at long tail phrases as its easier to break in, and your site can give the user exactly what they are looking for, which increases conversions.

WIth page rank, it has very little influence now. Most of my sites are at number 1 in google, and very few have a page rank. It used to be important, and you'll still find old pages on the web to say it is, but since paid links became so prolific its influence has drastically fallen.

In competitive area, age can be a big factor in your ranking. If there are lots of sites competiting for a term, initially newer sites won't get good rankings, but will move up if they are still around x months later. This is to try and stop spam sites that were being set up to get a good ranking and then removed as soon as they fall. Google assumes that if the sites still there 6 months later say, then its not as likely to be spammy and so its given a boost. I had one site that wasn't even in the top 100 3 months after launch, in a very competitive area. As a result I made the decision to abandon it, but leave it on the web just in case it got sales. 9 months later and it suddenly jumped to position 4, and as I hadn't done any work on it in that time (and it wasn't linked to as I wasn't promoting it), the age can be the only factor.

[Dazza30]

Thanks for the advice tbp

So by long tail phrases you mean something like [mobile cash back deals] i do target these kind of phrases, but im not 100% sure of how to work out if traffic will come from them.

I have been using the google keyword tool but ive heard the information it gives isnt allways accurate, is there a method to work out wether a keyword is worth using or not?

[tbp]

Its true that the Google external keyword tool isn't that accurate, but its gives you a rough idea of traffic volumes so can be used to pick keywords.

Try and target as many long tail keyphrases as you can. As they are long tail, not many sites will focus on them, so you can get a good ranking by having fewer of them on the page than you would with a competitive keyword.

One good source of long tail keywords is your own stats, especially if you use Google Analytics. Look at the phrases people are using to find your site, and then focus on them to get the best ranking you can for each one.

[Dazza30]

Thanks to everyone for your input, this forum continues to be a great source of info for me even after 2 years thanks!