Unlocking the Secrets of SEO
How Search Engine Optimization can bring business to your (virtual) door
There is a downside to creating a massively successful brand. To wit: We xerox documents and sneeze into a kleenex while rollerblading down the street, without a second thought about the authenticity of those branded products. The latest victim (?) of this phenomenon is Google. The verb form "to google," meaning to look something up on a search engine, was once the province of hipsters with ironic Mr. Bubble t-shirts and unfortunate ideas about facial hair. Now it's everywhere.

The Yellow Pages, by contrast, are now in the Living Dead category, feeble but still faintly visible, like air quotes, pagers and Regis Philbin. Today, looking for a new product or service means turning to a search engine (Google, Yahoo, or the seven dwarfs). People under the age of Medicare expect more complete information than that offered by a mere phone book.
There is a downside to creating a massively successful brand. To wit: We xerox documents and sneeze into a kleenex while rollerblading down the street, without a second thought about the authenticity of those branded products. The latest victim (?) of this phenomenon is Google. The verb form "to google," meaning to look something up on a search engine, was once the province of hipsters with ironic Mr. Bubble t-shirts and unfortunate ideas about facial hair. Now it's everywhere.

The Yellow Pages, by contrast, are now in the Living Dead category, feeble but still faintly visible, like air quotes, pagers and Regis Philbin. Today, looking for a new product or service means turning to a search engine (Google, Yahoo, or the seven dwarfs). People under the age of Medicare expect more complete information than that offered by a mere phone book.

Yahoo brings eager new prospects to your website For commodities like books or tickets or music, this can lead to a quick sale. For considered purchases, where you compete on more than price, it is the prospect's first research step to create a selection set, e.g., they enter search term ____________ (your category), and then examine ________, ________, and ________, three links to sites that seem appealing on page one of search engine results. One or more of these websites will be examined to see if it can clearly satisfy the need.

In an ideal world, we can pretend rational decision makers study three to five competitors in a selection set, fill out little charts of benefits with check marks and numerical scores, and add up the results. Dream on, pal. What really happens here on the planet Earth: the first site that seems like a fit gets clicked on. That website gets examined for suitability; if it passes muster, case closed, research stops. Being third in most selection sets is worth very little, since two competitors have to fail before you even get examined. If you show up 57th on Google? You're toast.

Once you get into a selection set, you've got a chance at a prospect knocking at your virtual front door who is pre-sold, knowledgeable, and eager to buy. If you're not in that set, the opportunity is lost; the odds that they'll conduct the initial search again are slim. The key questions: Does your visibility help or hurt your chances of getting in that pool of finalists? Can people who aren't specifically looking for you still find you when they're searching your category? Or are you just invisible?
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Self-Googling Is Nothing To Be Ashamed Of

Fargo SEO: Search Engine Optimization

Have you ever typed your own name into an Internet search engine such as Yahoo or MSN to see what people are saying about you? Don't worry, it's (more or less) normal.

But what seems a bit narcissistic in your personal life is just smart business when trying to build a brand. Try this little exercise: start searching, not for your company, but for your category. (If you make widgets in Oreginal Designs, do searches for "Oreginal Designs widget," "widgets," "low-carb widgets," and so on.) Where do you appear in the results? Are you in the first two results? The top ten? The top 1000? It doesn't take much insight into surfer psychology to realize that the top five results are going to get a lot more clicks than results seventy-five through eighty. Is where you are the place where you want to be?
We'll take that as a No.

So. How did the web sites near the top get there? And more important, how do you get there? Welcome to the wonderful world of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) where smart strategies plus hard work and clean code take you higher.

We know. We did it.

We have risen spectacularly, as you can see. Searches with a million results still found us high on Google's first page (the magical "top 30") ... and OreginalDesigns.com even reached the Holy Grail Top 5 on a number of relevant search terms. Feast your eyes on this:
Yahoo brings eager new prospects to your website For commodities like books or tickets or music, this can lead to a quick sale. For considered purchases, where you compete on more than price, it is the prospect's first research step to create a selection set, e.g., they enter search term ____________ (your category), and then examine ________, ________, and ________, three links to sites that seem appealing on page one of search engine results. One or more of these websites will be examined to see if it can clearly satisfy the need.

In an ideal world, we can pretend rational decision makers study three to five competitors in a selection set, fill out little charts of benefits with check marks and numerical scores, and add up the results. Dream on, pal. What really happens here on the planet Earth: the first site that seems like a fit gets clicked on. That website gets examined for suitability; if it passes muster, case closed, research stops. Being third in most selection sets is worth very little, since two competitors have to fail before you even get examined. If you show up 57th on Google? You're toast.

Once you get into a selection set, you've got a chance at a prospect knocking at your virtual front door who is pre-sold, knowledgeable, and eager to buy. If you're not in that set, the opportunity is lost; the odds that they'll conduct the initial search again are slim. The key questions: Does your visibility help or hurt your chances of getting in that pool of finalists? Can people who aren't specifically looking for you still find you when they're searching your category? Or are you just invisible?
Self-Googling Is Nothing To Be Ashamed Of

Have you ever typed your own name into an Internet search engine such as Yahoo or MSN to see what people are saying about you? Don't worry, it's (more or less) normal.

But what seems a bit narcissistic in your personal life is just smart business when trying to build a brand. Try this little exercise: start searching, not for your company, but for your category. (If you make widgets in OreginalDesigns.com, do searches for "OreginalDesigns.com widget," "widgets," "low-carb widgets," and so on.) Where do you appear in the results? Are you in the first two results? The top ten? The top 1000? It doesn't take much insight into surfer psychology to realize that the top five results are going to get a lot more clicks than results seventy-five through eighty. Is where you are the place where you want to be?

We'll take that as a No.

So. How did the web sites near the top get there? And more important, how do you get there? Welcome to the wonderful world of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) where smart strategies plus hard work and clean code take you higher.
We know. We did it.

We have risen spectacularly, as you can see. Searches with a million results still found us high on Google's first page (the magical "top 30") ... and OreginalDesigns.com even reached the Holy Grail Top 5 on a number of relevant search terms. Feast your eyes on this:

Website Design | Flash Design | Web Site Promotion | Hosting