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November 6, 2013 / Website SEO / No Comments »

Advantages of Getting Listed in Google Places

Does your target market know how to find your business?

Not sure? Then you may need to get listed in Google Places. As Google puts it, “Millions of people search Google Maps every day. A free listing on Google Maps makes it easy for them to find you.”

Not familiar? Well, Google Places is a widely used local directory that was developed specifically for businesses, and works like the Yellow Pages—except that it’s online. Once your business is registered, it will provide you with a landing page where you can place your complete contact information, highlight your products/services, describe what you offer and allow customers to give reviews.

 

Some of the benefits you can get from getting listed in Google Places include:

  1. High Ranking—Google may reward your site with high ranking and you will get that much-coveted spot in SERPs (search engine result pages).
  2. Targeted Traffic—As SEO experts always say, traffic is useless if it’s not targeted. Having your business listed in Google Places gives you the chance to promote your products and services to a targeted local market without having to shell out big money for it.
  3. Marketing Edge—not all businesses—and probably many of your competitors—are not listed in Google Places. This means that doing so gives your business an edge. Given the fact that many consumers look for services within their area using Google, then getting listed increases your chances of getting found by your prospects.

Looking into the above benefits, you can see how rewarding Google Places can be. If you have not signed up yet, then contact Oceania Internet today. Oceania Internet allows you to get listed in Google Places as part of our services, with no extra charge!

Once we have added your business listing to Google Places, you shall receive a postcard similar the one above, containing your unique personal identification number as well as the activation instructions. You will have to follow these instructions to validate your account and activate your listing. This shall prevent unauthorised people from modifying or altering your business listing.

November 6, 2013 / Website SEO / No Comments »

What is Backlinking?

A backlink is every mention your website earns from another relevant website. Each backlink means that someone has tried to tell other people about the information found on your site. Search engines count the number of backlinks a site earns in order to measure its reputation or popularity.
Backlinking is simply the process of acquiring incoming links to your website from other sites across the web. Each backlink you get earns you a “vote” for search engines. When you get enough “votes”, search engines assume that your website is a valuable source of information. Search engines then move your site up in the ranking. Therefore, when done strategically, backlinking will increase site visibility. As a result, it increases web traffic.

There are several ways you can earn a backlink. You can earn them in forums, web directories, blogs and Web 2.0 sites. The easiest way to earn one, however, is to strive to come up with useful and informative content each and every time. This is what you call “natural linking”. Other methods can be done strategically. For instance, there is a feature in forums

called “signature”. By including your website URL to your signature, you earn a backlink for your website every time you post comments on forum threads.

Another ‘common’ method you can use is commenting on relevant blogs whilst providing a link to your website.
Now, you may ask: Are all backlinks treated equally by search engines? The answer is no. This is why you often hear the term “quality backlinks”. There are three things that give weight to a backlink:
  1. Relevance. Does the link appear on a relevant website? If your website is about computers, for example, a backlink that appears on a travel website results in very little or no weight at all.
  2. Ranking. What is the search engine ranking of the website where the backlink is found? It is important to earn links from popular websites with high search engine rankings.
  3. How many similar websites are linked? The more similar websites linked on a page, the less weight the backlink receives.
When backlinking, it is important to also consider the websites where you want your links to appear. For example, you will want to avoid those sites that are considered as “spam sites”. Otherwise, search engines may penalise your site and you may never gain good rankings again.