Top 10 SEO Tips and Tricks for Beginners

It’s not easy to say what the top 10 best SEO tips really are, especially with all the so-called “experts” claiming to know the latest SEO tricks and “secrets Google doesn’t want you to know about.” It would take you days, even weeks to sort through this mess. So we thought we’d make it easy for beginners at SEO and condense all the clutter into what we call our Top 10 SEO tips and tricks.

Keep in mind, though, that we did not list these in any particular order. #1 will be just as important as #10 and so on. Our goal is not to say which tips are more or less valuable, but rather, to give beginners a starting point in their SEO efforts. These are all important and they apply to any industry or organization.

Top 10 Tips to improving your SEO


1. Keyword Research

It is essential when optimising your site, that the content is keyword rich. However, there is little point in writing keyword dense copy if the keywords are not commonly used in search terms.

It is advisable to keep keywords ambiguous when using any SEO tool, e.g. KeywordDiscovery or Google Adwords Keyword Tool. This will allow the SEO tool to return more suggestions, some of which may be surprising, and ones you had not thought of.

SEO tools will also allow you to see the levels of competition for the most popular keywords. This will allow you to optimise your campaign for the most effective keyword use.

Tips for Increasing your Traffic From Social Networking and Bookmarking Sites..

So What Are Some Ways That I Can Utilize Social Networking and Social Bookmarking Sites For Traffic?

(1) Utilize Your Existing ‘Real’ Friends
One great way to use social networking to increase traffic is to get all of your friends on a particular network to support your content on other sites. For example, you might post an article to a major social bookmarking site such as Digg or Del.icio.us. Then you can send a message to everyone that you know on your social networking sites asking them to take a minute to support your post on the bookmarking site. You can even encourage them to have their network support you as well. This increases your credibility on the social bookmarking site (because you’re getting a lot of Diggs on Digg for example) which will draw attention to your content there and send traffic to your site. **tip** If you are able to, organize an article post time so that your friends can digg, tag, or stumble your article within a 24 hour period (preferably within the hour).
(2) Make Friends with Strangers to Make a Large Network of Connections
Of course, you can also use social networking sites to make connections with complete strangers. This only works for some people because users tend to be wary of networking with complete strangers. However, if you develop a strong profile and a pitch to users of the networking sites, it can work. This is best for people who have a niche market that they want to work with. For example, if you work in the music industry, you can make friends with bands on a site like MySpace music; they’ll be interested in networking with you because it can be a mutually beneficial situation. Then you can use your increased network to drive traffic to your site.
(3) Bookmarks on Social Bookmarking Sites
Backflip
BlinkBits
Blinklist
BlogMarks
BlueDot
De.lic.ious
Digg
Diigo
Facebook
Furl (Looksmart)
Google Bookmarks
Magnolia
MyWeb Yahoo
Netscape
Netvouz
Newsvine
Popurls
Reddit
Simpy
Slashdot
Spurl
Squidoo
StumbleUpon
Technorati
YouTube / Flickr (media only)
4) Picture Perfect
You may not realize it, but by passing on uploading your picture, you are also passing on an opportunity to get more people clicking on your articles. Why? Well, for one, it is known that spammers never take the time to upload a picture. Second, it is called ’social’ networking and ’social’ bookmarking sites. If you are trying to be ’social’ then you should put a face to your name.
(5) Dress Up Your Profile
Think of your social networking profile pages as ‘real’ web pages … because really they are. Profile pages get spidered by search engines and they have links to other pages on the net, just like any other web page. You can utilize this profile to promote your web sites as well as your profiles on other social networking sites. For example, if I have a profile on MySpace, StumbleUpon, and LinkedIn, then I will want to link to:
* StumbleUpon and LinkedIn from MySpace
* StumbleUpon and MySpace from LinkedIn
* MySpace and LinkedIn from StumbleUpon
Not only will this increase the number of hits that I get on my profile pages via search engines and direct clicks, but it will also increase the number of friends that I have. The more friends that I have in my network, the more popular my profile and articles can become.
You should also add content and fill out information on your profile to show that you are an avid member. Add keyword relevant content on your profile page without being ’spammy’ about it. This will help with internal searches and possibly also with Google and other search engines. You can add content relevant feeds to some profiles with rss2image and other services.
(6) Leave Valuable Comments and Reviews
You might not like taking the time to leave thoughtful reviews and comments, but this is what needs to be done to be a successful social networker. Think about it, don’t you like people more when they are nice to you? I know that I like someone much better when they say nice things to me, especially when they are saying nice things about the articles I wrote or the site that I designed. Try only writing comments that you really mean, don’t be insincere, people will see right through the smoke.
(7) Tag Effectively
Make sure to take your time and tag your articles and sites effectively. These tags / keywords are how people find you. Take some time out to see how other people are tagging and copy methodology that seems to work.
(8) Titles That Catch the Reader’s Eyes
Unless people find your article’s title titillating , they won’t click on it. Even if your article is just so-so, if you spin the title in a way that makes it sound exciting, you will get people to click through to read it.
(9) Content is King
Nothing is more important than content. If you are a good writer and you write about interesting topics, you are going to do well on the social networking sites. People seem to like top 10 lists, top 20 lists, etc. I suggest that you look at digg.com to see what gets the most diggs. I have failed multiple times on getting a post digged or stumbled, even when I thought that it was the best article ever. You don’t always win.

THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IS THAT YOU KEEP AT IT AND DON’T GIVE UP … YOU WILL SUCCEED!


source : www.topseotricks.com 

Proven Tricks To Get Traffic from Social Bookmarking Site’s

Pay attention to your Headlines

Many great articles go unnoticed on social bookmarking sites because their headline is not catchy enough. Your headline is the first (and very often the only) thing users will see from your article, so if you don’t make the effort to provide a catchy headline, your chances of getting to the front page are small.
Here are some examples to start with :-
Original headline : The Two Types of Cognition
Modified Headline : Learn to Understand Your Own Intelligence
Original headline: Neat way to organize and find anything in your purse instantly!
Modified Headline : How to Instantly Find Anything in Your Purse


2Write a meaningful & short description

The headline is very important to draw attention but if you want to keep that attention, a meaningful description is vital. The description must be slightly provocative because this draws more attention but still, never use lies and false facts to provoke interest. For instance, if your write “This article will reveal to you the 10 sure ways to deal with stress once and forever and live like a king from now on.” visitors will hardly think that your story is true and facts-based.
You also might be tempted to use a long tell-it-all paragraph to describe your great masterpiece but have in mind that many users will not bother to read anything over 100-150 characters. Additionally, some of the social bookmarking sites limit descriptions, so you’d better think in advance how to describe your article as briefly as possible.

3Have a great first paragraph

This is a rule that is always true but for successful social bookmarking it is even more important. If you have successfully passed Level 1 (headlines) and Level 2 (description) in the Catch the User’s Attraction game, don’t let a bad first paragraph make them leave your site.

4Content is king

However, the first paragraph is not everything. Going further along the chain of drawing (and retaining) users’ attention, we reach the Content is King Level. If your articles are just trash, bookmarking them is useless. You might cheat users once but don’t count on repetitive visits. What is more, you can get your site banned from social bookmarking sites, when you persistently post junk.

5Make it easy for others to vote / bookmark your site

It is best when other people, not you, bookmark your site. Therefore, you must make your best to make it easier for them to do it. You can put a bookmarking button at the end of the article, so if users like your content, they can easily post it. If you are using a CMS, check if there is an extension that allows to add Digg, Del.icio.us, and other buttons but if you are using static HTML, you can always go to the social bookmarking site and copy the code that will add their button to your pages.


6Know when to submit

The time when you submit can be crucial for your attempts to get to the front page. On most social bookmarking sites you have only 24 hours to get to the front page and stay there. So, if you post when most users (and especially your supporters) are still sleeping, you are wasting valuable time. By the time they get up, you might have gone to the tenth page. You’d better try it for yourself and see if it works for you but generally posting earlier than 10 a.m. US Central Time is not good. Many people say that they get more traffic around 3 p.m. US Central Time. Also, workdays are generally better in terms of traffic but the downside is that you have more competitors for the front page than on weekends.

7Submit to the right category

Sometimes a site might not work for you because there is no right category for you. Or because you don’t submit to the right category – technology, health, whatever – but to categories like General, Miscellaneous, etc. where all unclassified stuff goes. And since these categories fill very fast, your chance to get noticed decreases.

8Build a top-profile

Not all users are equal on social bookmarking sites. If you are an old and respected user who has posted tons of interesting stuff, this increases the probability that what you submit will get noticed. Posting links to interesting articles on other sites is vital for building a top-profile. Additionally, it is suspicious, when your profile has links to only one site. Many social bookmarking sites frown when users submit their own content because this feels like self-promotion.

9Cooperate with other social bookmarkers

The Lonely Wolf is a suicidal strategy on sites like StubleUpon, Digg, Netscape. Many stories make it to the front page not only because they are great but because they are backed up by your network of friends. If in the first hours after your submittal you get at least 15 votes from your friends and supporters, it is more likely that other users will vote for you. 50 votes can get you to the top page of Digg.

10Submit in English

Linguistic diversity is great but the majority of users are from English-speaking countries and they don’t understand exotic languages. So, for most of the social bookmarking sites submitting anything in a language different from English is not recommendable. The languages that are at an especial disadvantage are Chinese, Arabic, Slavic languages and all the other that use non-latin alphabet. German, Spanish, French are more understandable but still they are not English. If you really must submit your story (i.e. because you need the backlink), include an English translation at least of the title. But the best way to proceed with non-English stories is to post them on where they belong.

11Never submit old news

Submitting old news will not help you in becoming a respected user. Yesterday’s news is history. But if you still need to submit old stuff, consider feature articles, howtos and similar pieces that are up-to-date for a long time.

12Check your facts

You must be flattered that users read your postings but you will hardly be flattered when users prove that you haven’t got the facts right. In addition to sarcastic comments, you might also receive negative votes for your story, so if you want to avoid this, check you facts - or your readers will do it.

13Check you spelling

Some sites do not allow to edit your posts later, so if you misspell the title, the URL, or a keyword, it will stay this way forever.

14Not all topics do well

But sometimes even great content and submitting to the right category do not push you to the top. One possible reason could be that your stories are about unpopular topics. Many sites have topics that their users love and topics that don’t sell that well. For instance, Apple sells well on Digg and The War in Iraq on Netscape. Negative stories - about George Bush, Microsoft, evil multinational companies, corruption and crime also have a chance to make it to the front page. You can’t know these things in advance but some research on how many stories tagged with keywords like yours have made the front page in the last year or so can give you a clue.

15Have Related Articles / Popular Articles

Traffic gurus joke that traffic from social bookmarking sites is like an invasion – the crowds pour in and in a day or two they are gone. Unfortunately this is true – after your listing rolls from the front page (provided that you reached the front page), the drop in traffic is considerable. Besides, many users come just following the link to your article, have a look at it and then they are gone. One of the ways to keep them longer on your site is to have links to Related Articles / Popular Articles or something similar that can draw their attention to other stuff on the site and make them read more than one article.

16RSS feeds, newsletter subscriptions, affiliate marketing

RSS feeds, newsletter subscriptions, affiliate marketing are all areas in which the traffic from social bookmarking sites can help you a lot. Many people who come to your site and like it, will subscribe to RSS feeds and/or your newsletter. So, you need to put these in visible places and then you will be astonished at the number of new subscriptions you got on the day when you were on the front page of a major social bookmarking site.

17Do not use automated submitters

After some time of active social bookmarking, you will discover that you are spending hours on end posting links. Yes, this is a lot of time and using automated submitters might look like the solution but it isn’t. Automated submitters often have malware in them or are used for stealing passwords, so unless you don’t care about the fate of your profile and don’t mind being banned, automated submitters are not the way to go.

18Respond to comments on your stories

Social bookmarking sites are not a newsgroup but interesting articles can trigger a pretty heated discussion with hundreds of comments. If your article gets comments, you must be proud. Always respond to commends on your stories and even better – post comments on other stories you find interesting. This is a way to make friends and to create a top-profile.

19Prepare your server for the expected traffic

This is hardly a point of minor importance but we take for granted that you are hosting your site on a reliable server that does not crash twice a day. But have in mind that your presence on the front page of a major social bookmarking site can drive you a lot traffic, which can cause your server to crash – literally!
I remember one of the times I was on the front page on Digg, I kept restarting Apache on my dedicated server because it was unable to cope with the massive traffic. I have many tools on my site and when the visitors tried them, this loaded the server additionally.
Well, for an articles site getting so much traffic is not so devastating but if you are hosting on a so-so server, you’d better migrate your site to a machine that can handle a lot of simultaneous hits. Also, check if your monthly traffic allowance is enough to handle 200-500,000 or even more visitors. It is very amateurish to attract a lot of visitors and not be able to serve them because your server crashed or you have exceeded your bandwidth!

20The snowball effect

But despite the differences in the likes of the different social bookmarking communities, there are striking similarities. You will soon discover that if a post is popular on one of the major sites, this usually drives it up on the other big and smaller sites. Usually it is Digg posts that become popular on StumbleUpon and Reddit but there are many other examples. To use this fact to your best advantage, you may want to concentrate your efforts on getting to the front page of the major players only and bet on the snowball effect to drive you to the top on other sites.
An additional benefit of the snowball effect is that if your posting is interesting and people start blogging about it, you can get tons of backlinks from their blogs. This happened to me and the result was that my PR jumped to 6 on the next update

source : www.topseotricks.com