Description

People ask me all the time how to get their website ranking better in Google.  I made a video which explained the basics of Search Engine Optimization and how Google works.This video, however, goes in-depth and updates what we know about Google’s ranking “preferences.”  In this video, Eric Spellmann shows how you can use content to drastically improve the relevance of your website in Google’s eyes.  His time-proven methods continue to put his clients at thetop of the list when their customers start searching.

If you want to know his secret, watch this video.

Transcript

Note from Eric: Below, you will find a word-for-word transcript of this video. I provide this as an aid for the hearing-impaired and for those who might just want to read it rather than watch the video. This conversational style is not reflective of how I write.  Be nice! Hi, I’m Eric Spellmann with Spellmann & Associates. And today’s topic is gonna be part 2 to one of my most popular topics, How to Rank Well on Google. You see every now and then, something changes. Google makes a change and they make 1 of their criteria for ranking a website more important than it used to be. And that’s what has happened.

When we talk about ranking well, one of the keys to understand is  relevance. They’re trying to program Google to work like a human. They want Google to look at your website, your web pages the same way a human would. And they’re wanting Google to rank your website based on relevance, just like a human being would! Google always asks what is this website about?

In other words, when their spider-bots go to your website, they’re trying to figure out what is this site relevant to? What subjects, what topics. What is this site about? Keep in mind that ranking well on Google is no longer about keywords. Okay! There’s a lot of people who’ll be calling you almost every month promising you to be number 1 when really all they’re talking about is Keyword Loading, which Google is definitely onto and they will spank you for it!

So what’s the answer? What do you do? The key is to understand what content is. The only way that Google can measure your relevance, just like a human being is content. Now what do we mean by content? Text is one form of content. And in Google’s world it is the most valuable content. It is the only thing Google can really understand. Some people throw meta tags out there saying that the meta keywords and meta description and secret words that we hide in your web page can help you rank better. And while that is a factor, it is now a very small factor. Google has lowered their ability to make any kind of changes, meta tags that is.

Pictures, not really relevant. Yes pictures are content but it is not content Google understands. Google has no idea that a picture of a giraffe is actually a giraffe. Now they’re getting better at this and they’re coming up with some ways to kind of figure things out, but right now the only way that Google has to measure what your website is truly about is the text!

What kind of content? What kind of text? There are 3 main things that I’ve discovered when trying to rank well with Google. These areas are things that we put into our customers’ websites and it works.

1. The text should be understood.
2. The text should be updated.
3. And the text should be unique.

Now I’m going to cover what each one of those means.

First, it must be understood. It must be conversational. Kind of like what I’m doing now. When you talk to somebody, you’re not trying to use big words. You’re not trying to impress them with your vocabulary. What I’ve discovered is that Google prefers a more conversational tone, somewhere between the 4th and 6th grade level. When we talk to people that’s how we talk, believe it or not. When we write, like we’re writing a paper for an English class, we tend to write at the high school or even college level. Google’s not looking for that.

They want your information to be as relevant and readable by as many people as possible. And that’s why the best scores tend to go to websites where there is conversation. In addition, I’m thinking that there needs to be about 400-600 words for Google to get a good idea of what you’re even talking about.

In order to understand what that page is about, you’ve got to have enough content to make a point. Once again, we’re not talking about keywords. In fact, you should throw that out! It’s not about loading keywords into your text. It’s about discussing a topic, so that a human being when they listen to it or read it, truly believe you’re relevant to whatever it is they’re searching
for.

Second, Google wants your content to be updated. They want your text to be updated. I don’t necessarily mean you need to go in and make a change to your homepage everyday. In fact from my studies, making changes to websites doesn’t necessarily improve your SEO. What seems to do the trick is when you add new ones. Google loves it when you’re constantly adding more and more topics to your website, more pages to your website. For instance, on my website whenever i add a new video, there’s a new transcript that goes with it. Google is slowly getting a picture of what my website is about. Provided the pages are the same topic, Google will typically reward the page with more content with a higher ranking.

I prefer static pages over blogs. Some people ask me do they need to add a blog so that they can add more and more content all the time. Not so much. My studies show that static pages tend to garner more ranking power than simply blog entries. Don’t get me wrong. People who have blogs rank very well. But, if you have a choice on whether you add your content to a blog or to simply another web page on your site (and that’s what I mean by static page) then I tend to go with the static page
choice. And that’s what I’ve done on my website!

Third, your content must be unique. This is HUGE! People, Google knows if you’ve copied your text from somewhere else. And Google will only give search credit to whoever had that content FIRST! Google is constantly looking for copycats. You know, copies of content even if they are full of the keywords you want, even if they are extremely relevant, written very well but if you weren’t the first person to have it, it does not matter. You’re not gonna get any help from Google in ranking. Now, some of my customers say “Eric my manufacturer of my products allows me to copy the product descriptions. OR allows me to copy this description because Eric I’m not a writer!”.

Well here’s the problem. That’s gonna hurt you. You’re not gonna gain any value from the descriptions of those products if they already exist somewhere else. They need to be re-written so that Google does not see them as a copy. And I’m not talking about permissions. Some people say “Well Eric you’re not supposed to copy things on the internet!” Yeah that is correct. Sometimes people have permission to do so though. And all I’m saying is whether you have permission or not, it will not help you to be the second one with that content.

It is very easy to test. If you’re not sure whether the content on your website is copied or not, simply grab a couple of sentences, copy and then paste em into Google. Put quotes around the beginning and the end. Google will look for that exact set of sentences anywhere on the internet. And typically that will give you a good idea if someone copied it when they
created your website.

So what are the solutions? I think you’ve kind of figured it out by now. Do it yourself! In other words, if you’re a writer, then write! Write content about what you sell. Write content about what your expertise is in. Make sure that it is conversational for the 6th grade level. Or, you can outsource it. And I’ll be honest. The majority of my customers choose to do that with a company like mine or with other companies out there or with writers that they hire. The key is content. And I’m here to tell you that if you do content correctly, if you put the right content on your website, you will see your rankings improve. I’ve proven it over and over again. So, what are you waiting for? Get out there and write.

If you have any questions, please visit my website ericspellmann.com. And if you want to talk about content, don’t hesitate to give me a call at the number on the screen or shoot me an email. I’m Eric Spellmann and I’ll see you in cyberspace.