If SEO is about attracting targeted visitors, then methods that can legitimately increase your site’s exposure to extra traffic work well within that remit.

One way of doing this is via syndication, and one of the big daddy’s of this is Google News. Any site that can get itself syndicated via Google News can potentially tap into extra traffic streams.

Not everyone can qualify, though, and generally you will want to ensure that any site submitted is generally family friendly, is constantly updated, and is so with articles of real informational value

Another qualifying criteria is that sites run by private individuals will not be syndicated. To be accepted into Google News, you have to ensure that the site is publishing under the auspices of a recognsed corporate body.

Something else to bear in mind - Google *do* keep a record of which sites have been submitted for Google News, so if you find yourself being rejected at first, don’t make a second request for inclusion until you’ve addressed any potential issues that caused it’s rejection in the first place.

On a more technical note, I’ve found that Google News can have problems where the article title is also the link to the title. So if you do have a site accepted for Google News, do watch out for this issue, and edit your site accordingly - ie, unlinked title at top of article, plus permalink at bottom.

Of course, it shouldn’t go without saying that images posted with your articles on your site can help clickthrough - even if your main headline gets buried in the “similar stories” link, your image can still show next to the whole entry.

On that point, it’s worth emphasising that the more original your information, the better - the same old popular news stories rewritten can simply keep you hidden in the “similar stories” list, leading to minimal traffic - while an original story is more likely to capture a swell of new visitors via Google News.

You also need to ensure that you add content regularly - Google News will publish a news item for 30 days, then it is removed from the news results. So constant new content is required to maintain any kind of presence in Google News.

Overall, being syndicated by Google News can bring in the extra traffic - but do note two key pitfalls.

The first is that the type of visitor is usually looking for information quickly, rather than a purchase. So try and find a way to encourage them to remain or revist the site - an “Add to Favourites” link could be invaluable here.

The second is that scrapers can and do republish stories from Google News, so watch out for your content being taken by other sites, not least “Spamsense” sites. Also, some scrapers post directly to spamblogs, so be aware of spam pingbacks being sent if your own site accepts them.

Here’s a summary of the above points:

1. Keep your site updated
2. Keep it clean and fresh
3. Be as original as possible
4. Use images where you can
5. Watch for technical problems
6. Ensure you submit company-administrated sites
7. Don’t resubmit your site after rejection, unless you’ve made real changes

Here’s the submit URL: Submit to Google News

Too often prospective clients are looking to capture traffic and sales from just a couple of different major keywords.

Often, these keywords are very similar – singular and plural versions of the same term, for example.

The real secret to working with keywords in links to work with as varied a spread of keywords of possible, in order to capture as many different keyword combinations of these as possible.

Although Wordtracker and Overture keyword checkers may show some keywords as having high volumes of searches, you often need to be cynical about these.

After all, in competitive keyword areas, many searches are performed by vendors checking their own positions – instead of actual prospective customers. And this bloats the traffic volumes.

What Wordtracker and Overture keyword lists often don’t illustrate is that there can be an incredible range of related keyword related searches.

Each of these may have an very small volume – perhaps once a month – but once you start to add these together, they can equate to a HUGE volume of potential traffic, that even beats major keywords.

What’s more, you can often find that the more competitive keywords are relatively generic – good for window shoppers – so the conversion ratio isn’t so great.

However, much more precise searches in the Longtail can convert much better, because you’re capturing search traffic that has already made a purchasing decision.

Last year, a new client who is otherwise “sandboxed” for most of his major keywords switched off his PPC and went on holiday for 2 weeks.

When he came back, there was over £8,000 ($15,000) in orders waiting for him. And this is during a slow season.

Almost all of these orders were generated through a large volume link campaign, which specifically aimed to capture lots of different keyword combinations – links that didn’t simply aim for major keywords, but a whole variety of them.

The Longtail remains a very underestimate SEO strategy, but you ignore it at your own cost.

There’s a lot of general discussion on the need for “on-topic” links.

Google is perceived by some to particularly reward “on-topic” links.

But not every page with a link is going to be devoted to that topic – heck, you only have to consider Google itself.

Consider how many times you see people link to Google – how many of those webpages are specifically about search engines?

Probably not many – but instead about an unrelated subject, where Google is recommended as a resource for finding out more.

Off-topic links are a natural part of the structure of the web, and because of that, are always useful – for human users and search engines.

And the simple truth is that off-topic links work and are effective for SEO campaigns.

While on-topic links are desirable, this can really push up a budget considerably. Frankly for many small businesses to insist on on-topic links only is not simply difficult, it’s unnecessary.

My personal SEO philosophy is not to simply deliver results, but to deliver results in a very cost-effective manner.

After all, would you rather pay $5,000 or $1,000 to generate $10,000 in sales?

Off-topic links can be a very cost-effective way to generate keywords links in volume – and develop corresponding traffic and sales because of it.

Web directories have a variable reputation in SEO.

On the one hand, they are often regarded as little better than link farms. Even worse, they almost certainly provide “low-trust” links.

Even still, I use directory listings as a strategic part of my overall SEO campaign.

This is not because I want to use directory titles to “link bomb” into listings – but as a key part of a spidering strategy.

Having a search engine friendly site requires that search engines can actually find and index it, and web directories are a way to help ensure a stable of static links that search engines can use to find it.

It also helps raise the overall profile of a website online.

Sometimes the page listings can capture key Longtail searches that – if you are listed prominently enough on – can help expose your target company to human users, and even capture qualified sales leads.

When it comes to SEO strategies, a directory-only approach isn’t going to be a big help for competitive business verticals.

However, when enrolled into a wider SEO campaign utilising multiple strategies, I personally consider it to be an invaluable part of the armoury.

One of the more recent “crazes” is to write articles to generate links,

It’s not a new method for SEO – it’s as old as the internet. The difference being, as Google becomes more restrictive on ranking criteria, article submissions have become a latest desperate grab for rankings.

The problem here is that while links across a larger number of websites and IP ranges is welcome for link building, the duplicate content issue means that many SEO’s focused on article writing may be negating their own strategy.

This is especially if we presume that when it comes to duplicated content, Google is not going to allow much “juice” to be sent from such pages.

Even an argument that benefits may still exist with duplicated content, the bottom line is that it’s unwelcome.

To help circumvent this, here’s a couple of tips when it comes to writing and submitting articles to third-party websites:

1. Vary your article titles as much as possible

2. Vary the subheadings. You do use keywords subheading in your article, don’t you? If not, you should look to do so.

3. Vary the text where possible – you can even set up a simple script randomise the central paragraphs, so that many of your article submissions will be slightly but significantly different.

4. Vary resource boxes – the information and links they contain – as much as possible. Also ensure you add at least one good deep content link per resource

5. Submit to fewer article sites – less really can be more. By submitting to the best quality article sites out there, not only can you limit the extent of your duplicated content, but you can also ensure the best sites provide the strongest thrust for your links.

As with other linking methods, article writing and submission isn’t going to be an effective strategy all by itself.

However, I do use it to supplement other key SEO strategies in order to create a more stable platform for a SEO campaign.

And also don’t forget that article submissions timed with new content on your own site, could be a way to help improve how fast that is indexed – a key concern in more competitive markets.

The Google Sandbox is an old system.

It was first noticed in April 2004, when volume link builders (such as myself) found that instead of immediate ranking effects from volume link building, as expected, it now took 3 months before those links would impact.

Since then the Google Sandbox has come to encompass a varied range of filters that Google seems to have developed in order to prevent easy manipulation of rankings – with the result that many newer domains have an awful time ranking for major keywords.

If you’re a results-driven person like myself, then it can be initially unnerving. But all is not lost.

For websites with a lot of content (such as informational sites and ecommerce sites) you can still capture a lot of Longtail searches.

I have a client who still is sandboxed for a number of his targeted keywords. However, we capture enough sales from the Longtail traffic to make the SEO campaign more than profitable from him on that basis alone.

However, I’ve recently taken up a new strategy for him to help fight sandboxing.

Instead of just trying to rank his website, I’m now ranking webpages on “trusted” third party sites – on pages dedicated to promoting his products/services.

So far it’s working very well – because the pages are on older and more trusted domains, Google has no problem ranking for those pages for the keywords used in the links.

In just a couple of weeks he captured half of his targeted keywords into Top 10 rankings on this method alone, plus he also has his own site represented in various positions – and all in addition to the capture of sales from Longtail search traffic.

Although ranking third-party sites instead of your targeted website isn’t ideal – not least because it introduces another click between a visitor finding a listing to view, and the destination webpage – it can at least provide a short-term solution to a short-term problem.