So your website (s) was also hit by the recent Penguin update from Google! You are not alone!, Most of the webmasters who were using traditional link building methods for their off page SEO, got hit by this crucial algorithm update from Google on 24th April this year. Also the websites which were using blackhat techniques got severely slapped. And if you are hoping to get solution for your lost ranking issue then I must confess – you are absolutely right!

Before I tell you the effective link building strategy after Google Penguin, you must know why this algorithm change actually took place. The primary reason behind this update was to encounter the automated blackhat link building process. Also the quality of backlink was another major issue on which this update was processed. 

Lets accept the fact that your website had some shady (unnatural) issue. In most chance your backlink profile seemed ‘unnatural’ to the eye of Google. And if you want to recover from Penguin, your need to repair that damage as much as you can. So how to go about it? Here are the ways – 

‘Quality over quantity’ – you may have heard this phrase several times, including in this post also! But to what extent you have implemented, is the main concern. Definitely you need to implement it now after the Google penguin. But how? 

As I stated before also, your backlink profile should look natural in the eye of Google. Keeping that in mind, you need to adopt only those link building methods which will not look spammy, and most importantly Google should not think that you are actually doing any link building for your website! Is it really feasible? Yes it is! 

Google seems to give more importance to social backlink these days, specially after they them self launched Google plus. Now if you are smart enough, you should be able to understand the trend. Yes you need to build a strong social influence through facebook, twitter and others, if you haven’t done that already. 

Look for unconventional link building techniques – advantage of these link building strategies is that Google may not ‘trace’ as artificial link building. One such strategy which you can look for is guest posting. Also while guest posting try to acquire in-content links, as author bio backlink may not be that effective as it is easily ‘traceable’ by Google bot. 

Relevant blog commenting is another effective link building technique which has become more powerful after Google Penguin. While commenting try to avoid keyword in name field, as it looks artificial; hence easily detectable. To get the maximum benefit from blog commenting, you can insert your link within comment body whenever applicable; without defacing the primary essence. 

Also do not ignore the traditional link building mechanism such as directory submission, social bookmarking etc. They are equally important as they were. But the main issue which you need to care about after the Google penguin – is diversifying your backlink profile as much as you can.

Refer to the post when I made a bold statement by saying "Facebook on the rise Google slipping its grip". At that time many readers did not agree with me. But from the date of posting that topic, Google has continuously loosen battle to Facebook. And it realized quickly that some real steps needs to be taken to stop Facebook avalanche. And it did actually; with a weapon called Google plus (G+). Now G+ is open in public, the war between Google and Facebook is completely explicit. But is there any real reason for Facebook to worry about G+?


There are variety of differences. First of all when Google released (rather 'Experimented') social network like Google Plus its popularity on the internet was not challenged. Google knew if the 'experiment' fails then also it would still be the biggest power on internet. Now do a quick time machine journey to come back to present. For last couple of years, the Facebook has eaten up the dominance of Google in several parts around the world. And it is threatening Google in some major countries in North America and West Europe. Also Facebook made it clear that it would like to enter the search market as well, by joining with another Google rival Bing.

Now that is quite threatening for company like Google, whose primary internet business is search market. Google did not pay much attention when Yahoo and Bing joined hand or when Baidu made strategic search relationship with Bing. But when Facebook, the major rival wished to enter the search market, Google sensed danger. So it planned to hit Facebook on its arsenal i.e. social network. Also Google is experienced enough to recognize the future trend of search market, which is slowly but steadily moving towards social search. So for Google, it was almost necessary to step big foot on this market. Also the stage was almost set for Google plus. Why?

Because Google was aware that many facebook users were complaining about the changes that were made recently, be it miserable Chatting experience or latest makeover. Google was silently watching all these and was planning the perfect launching pad. And Google plus indeed was the perfect launching pad for Google. You will see that all the pitfalls of Facebook was taken into account in Google+. So now it is time for only the real internet battle for dominance. And we must enjoy it all the way from starts and until it finishes (though I have doubt if it will end or not). So here we go..

In the early ages, Internet meant Lycos. In those times, nobody could imagine internet without Lycos. But after the Yahoo conquered the internet, the scenario completely changed. Every other users of internet almost forgot Lycos. And it was Yahoo all over. Then Google came and within couple of years Google became synonyms of internet. Today Yahoo is just a shadow of the past.

I think you are now getting the picture quite clear; “the changing pattern”. Whenever one major internet technology comes, the users engross it completely forgetting the predecessor. We are once again verge of such change. As Facebook is growing at a lightening rate, importance of it is also increasing from business point of view also. In many parts of the globe, Facebook has already overtaken Google. And they are doing it at an aggressive growth.

If these trends continue, Google is in deep danger for sure. Though from the logical point it seems pretty unrealistic (Google still holds 40% of total internet), but if the “changing pattern” is to be followed it may not be that impractical either! Because “Time spent” on Facebook is much greater than that of Google; for this reason cumulative time spent on Facebook is quite high. If this parameter is to be followed, Facebook is already famous than Google! So what next? Watch out for a complete shift in the world of Internet.
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In the previous two posts I told you about the basics of SEO i.e.

Competition Analysis and Keyword selection , where I discussed the importance of competition analysis and proper keyword selection.

Then I briefly guided you how to implement those analyzed data for best results; in the topic Optimizing your On-page elements for Google

Now it's the turn of most important part of SEO i.e Building Backlinks to your website which comes under Off-page SEO. I will cover the PR issue, Quantity of backlinks and how to measure the quality of Backlinks to your website/blog. I will give you some suggestion regarding "Availing free Backlinks" for your website/blog at the end of this topic.

You may be amazed to know how PageRank (Commonly known as PR, the idea of PR was create by Google co-founder Larry page) can alter the search results in Google. To understand the significance of PR, I will give you a real time example. Suppose two different webpages with same on-page elements (identical content, title etc) are trying to rank one in Google for a keyword. Then how will Google distinguish those pages? Here comes the importance of PR. In this case, the one with higher PR will get the preference in search result.

Now the obvious question comes; How Google determines the PR for a webpage?

To simplify; PR of a webpage is determined by how other websites "vote" (both quantity and quality counts) for that webpage. Here the term vote is referred as "link". Higher the number of links; higher the PR of that website. PR of a website can not exceed 10 as PR is measured on a scale of 0 to 10.

When calculating PR of a website/blog; quality of backlinks matter not quantity. Let me explain it bit further. Suppose your website has a "backlinks" from a PR 8 or higher and also from a PR 1 website. In both cases you have one backlink but the importance of first link is higher. May be 100 such links from second source will not be equivalent to first one. That's why Dmoz listing (Dmoz listing Secrets)is considered so much important for webmaster.

Getting backlinks to your website/blog is most significant part from the Off-page SEO perspective. Availing quality backlinks to your website helps you to increase your PR which in returns improve your search engine ranking. But the obvious question that arises is "How can you gain the backlinks?". Let me discuss your concern.

Most easy and simple process of obtaining handful of backlinks is to create "Unique & Quality" content; which will generate reference link to your content. What's most promising factor of this method is that it's a never ending process. That means you can expect backlinks from that content in near future as well.

There is a con this option also which is , it is only viable for content rich website/blog. This method holds good for service oriented website also. Then what about those site which has neither of this?

For them Directory is better option. Submit your website to as many directories you can afford. Be cautious about "Auto directory submission service". Also be aware about the "Paid submission" because Google may penalize you.

In this section I will list all websites from where you can get free backlinks to your website/blog

1. www.dmoz.org This is the most influential in terms of upgrading your website's PR value. While listing your website pay close attention to proper category selection for your website. It will take at least 1 month for listing in Dmoz (List your Website Fast to Dmoz). Once your website is listed in Dmoz you can expect 100% hike in your traffic from search engine.

For more list of free directories search in Google with keyword "free directory". You will get a list of websites where you can list your website to boost your PageRank.

After completing the competitors analysis for your niche, time has come to implement those analyzed data into your website. If you have not gone through the crucial post about Analyzing your competitor to the Core, then you must enjoy it.

On page analysis include four important aspects i.e.

1. Title of your website/blog

2. Link Structure of your website/blog

3. Content of your website/blog

4. Meta description of your website/blog

I will serially discuss one after another; so that you can efficiently use these elements to optimize your website/blog for Google results. How can you do this? Watch out the next section!

For ranking high in Google "Title" is the single most important on-page factor. So if you want to rank number one on Google, then you must be able to use keyword rich and optimized title tag in your website/blog. How can you optimize the title for best result? I will tell you now. For that I will take the previous example of http://www.freeonlinecouponforall.com/ again, you may remember our main keyword was "free coupon". To rank well for that keyword, we must optimize the use of "free coupon" in website/blog's title tag. To experience the best result you must include your website's title within 65 characters(this data has been derived from intense research). You must not separate the keywords in title tag by using word like and,or etc; instead you may use the "|" character for optimization purpose. In the above example an optimized title would be "Free online coupon| Get gift coupon free".

Next comes the "link structure" of your website/blog. Your website's link must be "human readable". What's that meant. Let me explain the matter with help of a example. Suppose your website contain a page with the link http://www.freeonlinecouponforall.com/index.html=search_items?=christmas_coupon, but that is not a kind of link structure from which a human can understand, what he/she can expect from the link. But if the link structure is modified to http://www.freeonlinecouponforall.com/search/christmas_coupon/, then visitor can easily comprehend the subject of the specified link. The latter link is much optimized for search result.

Content is king, you have heard this thing million times. And it is not untrue! To rank well in search result, your website/blog's content must be optimized for your keyword. That does not mean you stuff your content only with keywords. That also does not imply, your content should be keyword less! But you should mix your content and keyword well; like mixing spice with chicken! You must know the right proportionate to sell your content to search engines. The right balance for ranking well in search result is about 3-4% keyword and rest other word.

Meta description text is the region to test your internet marketing skills. Make this text attractive to Searchers to draw the required attention to click your website in search result.

Format for meta description is given below

<meta name= "description" content= "Write a internet smart text about your website/blog within 255 words"/>

Oh yes, I have not forgot the "meta keywords" but I deliberately skipped  the issue, because it does not hold the kind of importance which it held some years back. In fact search engine major Google does not give any value to meta description now.

You must be able to implement these suggestions which I discussed above to rank well in various major search engines including Google, Bing and Ask. But this is very little part of "Total SEO", today's competitive internet market condition require strong Off-page improvement to ranking on top of search results. That part would be discussed in next post.

You are now quite aware of the importance of being at top of Google after reading the post about "What it actually means to be Google....."

Now come back to real world and real competition! One thing is quite evident that "If You are to Achieve Google top position" for certain keyword, you have to know the REAL competition and your competitors to the core. That means you should first know real ground analysis about your niche, domain competition, and most important ; your competitor. If you haven't done that yet, start immediately. How? That's what I will be telling you right now.

For your better understanding I will pick a common keyword "free coupon". And for the time being you imagine your website/blog is on this (free coupon) topic with a name, say http://www.freeonlinecouponforall.com/ and the keyword you are targeting is "free coupon" to get to the Google top.

Start your analysis with a quick search on Google.com by entering the keyword "free coupon". You will see there are about 73.5 million (73,600,000 to be specific) pages that have qualified to be on Google's index. That indicates competition for your niche is pretty high. (and it will become higher by time!). But you need not to worry about it, what you need to worry is "your rank" in this long list. Let us assume you rank on 4th page at 7th position. That means your rank is 47 and no doubt it is quite low. Our aim (your also) is to improve your ranking from 47th to 1st.

At this point of time your competition as well as your target is fairly clear to you. You have to surpass the preceding 46 websites of SERP to achieve your goal. To do it you need to know where your competitors stand presently. Take the first result of Google for example which is http://www.couponmom.com/. Google PR of this website is 6 (quite good). URL of the website contain "coupon" good part of whole keyword. Also the website title has the word "coupon" 5 times which is good for the site.

Also the website has used the word "coupon" and "free" extensively in its meta description and keywords (coupon is its primary keyword). After the on-site analysis, I must say this website has the right to be at the top on Google.

What about the off-site issue of the website. From the Alexa, I can see this website has 652 back links (some of they pretty quality links like Youtube,Yahoo etc). Major parts (almost all) of this backlinks are do-follow and majority of them has an anchor text "Coupon" or "Couponmom" or "Free coupon" which correctly follow with the Google. That completes our first of 46 competitor analysis. But from first analysis you will be getting the picture how to go about the competitors analysis.

Last but not least is the proper implementation of the analyzed result, which is the most important section of the the whole SEO process. This implementation will be discussed in my next post. I will discuss it in a very detail manner so that both beginner and professional can understand every single line of that post.

Webmaster around the world are getting crazing to achieve just one thing. What is that?

Guess, guess........ though you will get no prize for the right answer. Because common goal of all webmasters is to reach to top on Google. They have valid reason for running behind this craze. Let me tell you why.

Lets explain the importance of it bit more.

Consider a giant tree with uncountable number of flowers of same color and size, all are very beautiful. And there are few flower with more attractive color combination. If a person who love flower has to choose just one flower from the bunch, which will he/she choose? Very unpredictable right? But if any of those attractive flowers come to the reach of that person; he/she will never look others. Getting to the top on Google means you have the extra reach to your visitor. And an effective SEO does just that work for your website/blog.   

Now a days if any website willing to generate a good business online, he/she must be ranking on top of Google for some popular (at least One) keywords related to his/her business domain. By "top of Google" I actually mean top three position of search result page.

Now I will discuss how you can achieve this top position in Google for any keyword. Whether you own a new website/blog or a website/blog which has been online for sometime now, these tips which I will be suggesting here are applicable for all.

For next few posts I will be concentrating on "how can YOU achieve the top position at Google" for a specific selected keyword or for group of keywords related to your domain. To achieve this you must abide by some basic guidelines which includes:-

i) You must have a website/blog.

ii) You should be able to change the basic HTML of that website/blog.

iii) Lastly you MUST implement the strategies mentioned here on your website/blog.

That's what you all have to do!

For now entertain yourself by reading the topic about "Current search market scenario" and keep yourself updated with latest trends in search market.

Don't tell me you are not getting the picture! From the picture itself current search market condition is quiet evident. If not let briefly discuss it.

From latest buzz from StatCounter Google hold nearly 90% of total search market worldwide. In US search market also Google dominate with 80% market share. So the supremacy of Google is quite inevitable.

On the other hand , after Bing had entered the search market, Yahoo has loss its market share dramatically.

From 17% search market share its share has dropped to 4% only. In US also, Yahoo does not lie in comfort zone. Yahoo have nearly 9% of total search market share of US search. Most worst part of it is that they are continuously loosing their search share globally as well in US.

When Bing launched everyone in the market anticipated that something is going to happen! Believe me or not that "Something" has really took place, which is Google strengthening its position! Promise that Bing made has not kept till date. But surely it made Google to brought some changes, which are actually benefiting surfers worldwide. From stat point of view Bing currently holds 3.5% search market share worldwide and 8.5% of total US search. But good (for improvement of search) thing is that Bing's share is increasing, though very slowly.

Other than these three (In near future it is likely to be Google Vs Bing) Ask has some significant but very low search market share (1%). Ask's share is not varying with the time and it is very unlikely that it can emerge as main contestant in search market. Oh yes I am not forgetting Baidu, the china major. But it's penetration is limited only in china and there is little chance that Baidu can make footprint in Global search market.