Archive for the ‘SEO Training’ Category

How To Build Links And Backlinks To Your Website – Startup.info

SEO practice generally includes off-site SEO and on-site SEO, of which the former deals with building links and backlinks. This link-building practice, in turn, helps increase your websites search engine results page (SERP) ranking by acquiring quality links from various authority websites.

That is the reason why building links plays an integral part in SEO building strategy. You will learn how to efficiently build links and backlinks to your website for best results in the lines below.

Find Out Your Competitors:

An important part of link building involves knowing who your competitors are. Your competition is with leading performers who challenge your targeted keywords on Google.

Heres how you can find who your competitors are:

Related Search

On Google, start performing a related search to see which websites have similar topics to yours. On your search bar, type: related: [the URL of your website].

The results will show all those websites that compete with you on the domain level.

Keyword Search

Now, for each of your target keywords, perform a keyword search. Note down all the top pages that compete with you on every search engine results page (SERP).

You might observe that specific websites keep cropping up again and again. Make sure to add these websites to your list of domain-level competitors. Competitors on page level get ranked based on 1-2 focus keywords, but their importance should not be ignored.

However, dont get into personalized searches because they will affect the results of performing SERP. Just change your SERPs URL to avoid personalized searches.

Analyze Your Competitors Backlinks:

Backlinks are not always created to be equal. For adding worth to your strategy on link building, it will be important to add quality backlinks from well-respected sources. Similarly, to maximize the profits you can get from your link-building tactics, you must ensure that you are making the most of the backlink opportunities.

These tips will help you analyze the backlinks of your competitors:

Check for Backlink Quality

When it comes to backlinks, quality supersedes quantity. So, when checking your competitors backlinks, stay away from spammy blogs or forums. Search for famous blogs that are industry-related, thought leaders who are influential, and media sources that are well-reputed.

Recognize those referrers with high scores in page authority and top domain authority, recent content, and a good deal of organic traffic. It will also help you to select referring pages with several backlinks of their own. The more significant number of referrals linking back to your websites referring page will guarantee more clicks on your page.

Note The Placement of Backlinks

Observe where the backlinks in the articles are placed. Use logic to understand which links a reader would click on while reading an article. Certain links gain much prominence with their location either alongside intriguing content or over-the-fold appearance.

In contrast, other links are found at the lower end of an article. If you are searching for an opportunity to link, but your selected site intends to bury your anchor text within the content or plans to surround it with various other links, you should change your mind.

How Relevant the Backlink Is

Several websites pay to have their links placed on various referring sites to improve their backlink quantity, irrespective of what the sites contain.

The best way to use backlinks is to place your links on websites with relevant content, which will be helpful for your audience. Look for opportunities to backlink in articles where your product or content will be able to provide additional supplementary support to the reader.

When a reader is confident that they will find more information by clicking on a link, they usually click on that link. You should not expect any clicks if you find that the anchor link is more of an advertisement for a spammy product.

Cyber Security Tips for Your Website:

Cyber attackers have no discrimination while attacking online companies, irrespective of their size. Here are some effective cyber security ideas that can protect your website from cyber-attack:

Incorporate Identity Theft Protection

Hackers can efficiently steal your companys identity by stealing the domain name, hacking into bank accounts associated with your company, and committing a crime for which you can become liable. It is crucial to opt for identity theft protection to prevent any damage to your companys reputation or your finances.

Ensure that your software is up-to-date

Software updates are made to either add new features or upgrade security or fix bugs (known). To keep your software protected from vulnerabilities, update it to its latest version all the time.

Hardware Update

The software security upgrades sometimes fail to find support from hardware, especially if the hardware is backdated. Also, outdated hardware can be ineffective in responding to cyber-attacks. Your hardware should be well-maintained and up-to-date.

Avert Suspicious Emails

If you think an email looks suspicious, dont open it. Such emails can be either a phishing scam or might contain links or attachments that will infect the device in which it is opened.

Dont Keep Bluetooth on

A strong way to find entry into your personal information is through a device hack using Bluetooth. Keep it turned off when not in use.

Keep a White Hat Hacker in Your Office

Such hackers can bring to light any security risk or enhance cyber security using their talent. Hiring such a hacker can be profitable for your business.

Employee Training

Perform regular training to keep your employees informed about cyber-attack threats and vulnerabilities. Even if one employee makes a mistake, it can cost the entire company a lot.

Broken Link Building Method:

Broken links are links that dont work and lead to either 404 pages or Pages Not Found. Broken link building involves a white-hat tactic of providing backlinks to the content you create rather than 404 pages. It serves the purpose of SEO. To build links and backlinks through broken links, you must:

Guest Post Articles:

A highly efficient way to build backlinks to your site is guest blogging. It provides authority-based quality backlinks, which is way better than article marketing. The reason behind this is that the blogs you use for guest posting have already received credibility from Google for not publishing duplicate content.

Authority and Linking through Guest Posts

There are also several blogs whose page rankings are impressively high, which facilitates your article to remain for a considerable time on their homepage. If the article you write is impressive, you will be able to get more links to your article, and this will add authority, which will be transferred to your site.

Crowd Marketing

Crowd marketing focuses on a huge audience base made of different groups by using various techniques for building referrals, generating leads, and increasing website traffic. Using crowd marketing, you can target extremely specified online communities to expect traffic inflow to your site, resulting in more leads and, eventually, more customers.

Links in Social Media Profiles

A less-used method for building links and backlinks is using social media. The page rank of several social networking and social bookmarking sites is high, which can channelize to flow into your site. Add the URL of your site to the field of different social media sites, and expect a great number of backlinks. Some social media sites you can use include:

Most of these social media platforms allow you to provide your sites link in your bio. Doing this will help you reach out to a large audience and build top-quality backlinks.

Building links and backlinks are hard work that requires consistency, similar to other SEO aspects. The more effort you put into link building, the better and more-lasting results you will achieve through this SEO practice. The strategies and ideas mentioned above will be able to guide you to achieve the results that you intend for your website.

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How To Build Links And Backlinks To Your Website - Startup.info

Advanced. Actionable. Invaluable. Get your SMX Advanced sneak peek here. – Search Engine Land

Advanced search marketers like you need a training experience that speaks to your level of expertise, skips the basics, dives deep, and leaves no stone unturned.

Attend SMX Advanced online June 14-15, to learn elite, brand-safe, actionable search marketing tactics for free without leaving your desk.

Programmed by the Search Engine Land editors, this experts-only training program explores the latest, most sophisticated SEO and PPC topics and trends, including

and so much more.

Overtime, engaging Q&A with speakers, follows most sessions giving you plenty of opportunities to get your specific questions answered in real-time. And the entire program is available for you to explore live or at any time that fits your schedule no plane ticket, no hotel booking, no expense reports required.

For 15 years, more than 150,000 search marketers from around the world have attended SMX to learn game-changing tactics, connect with industry legends, and further their careers. Dont miss your chance to join them online for the only professional training experience created by advanced search marketers for advanced search marketers.

Secure your free pass nowand well see you online, June 14-15!

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Advanced. Actionable. Invaluable. Get your SMX Advanced sneak peek here. - Search Engine Land

The Top Google Analytics Training Courses for Marketers to Take in 2022 – Solutions Review

The editors at Solutions Review have compiled the following list to spotlight some of the best Google Analytics training courses for marketers of all experience levels to consider taking.

If your marketing team wants to kickstart or improve its marketing analytics strategy, Google Analytics can probably help. As one of the most popular analytics platforms in the marketplace, Google Analytics is capable of helping marketers monitor, analyze, and optimize their website traffic. However, if youre unfamiliar with the platform, you should consider a training course to help you get started on the right foot.

To help, the editors at Solutions Review have spotlighted the following Google Analytics training courses for marketers to consider improving their skills and platform expertise.

Provider:Coursera

Description:This beginner-level certification course has no prerequisites and can be taken by anyone looking to break into the analytics marketplace. Over approximately six months, aspiring data analysts will learn from Google employees and experts and understand the practices and tools needed in the high-paced world of marketing and data analytics. Topics covered include cleaning data for analysis, developing data spreadsheets, R programming, data visualizationTableau, and presenting data findings via dashboards and presentations.

Provider:Edureka

Description:Google Analytics is one of the most widely-used analytics platforms globally, so theres a lot of value in learning to master the capabilities and tools. With this online self-directed training course, learners will use structured training exercises, videos, presentations, projects, and assignments to enhance their Google Analytics skills. Some of the subjects covered include an introductory overview of web analytics products, categories, segmentation, case studies, and techniques. Meanwhile, the Google Analytics-specific tools introduced in the course include audience reports, e-commerce analytics, behavior analysis, social media analytics, data analysis, and conversions.

Provider:Skillshare

Description:With this compact, intermediate-level course, aspiring data analytics will learn to use Google Analytics to identify what web pages are most successful, why those pages are successful, where the traffic is coming from, who the visitors are, and what sources are sending people to the site. Other subjects covered in the course include demographic reports, using behavior reports to learn how to keep people on a page for longer, segmenting data to discover new insights, and measuring marketing performance with real-time information. The course uses a series of 13 videos and a hands-on class project to help learners practice and hone the skills theyve learned.

Provider: LinkedIn Learning

Description:From Madecraft and Brad Batesole, an internationally recognized marketing thought leader, this ninety-minute training course is designed to help active Google Analytics users learn to use the platforms more advanced tools and capabilities. Learners who enroll in the course will learn how to track Google Analytics users with User-ID, measure events, report on event flows, create and manage filters, add new views, apply segments, and become familiar with the advanced features available on the platform.

Provider: LinkedIn Learning

Description: This course is a great place to start for marketing teams looking for a class to teach them about the out-of-the-box functionalities available from Google Analytics. The program explains how a business can use analytics to understand who its audience is and how to engage with them with tools like behavior reports, segmentation, tracking tags, and funnel visualization. Students who enroll will also learn how to set up a Google Analytics account, work with its essential reporting tools, graph data over time, use annotations in their reports, set goals, and determine their audiences demographics, interests, and location.

Provider:Udemy

Description:This beginner-level Google Analytics training course will teach users to identify their audience, track website engagement, understand where web traffic comes from, optimize web content for SEO, and see how users navigate the website. Specific skills covered in the training course include Google Analytics Behavior Reports, campaign tagging, custom report management, custom alerts, goal tracking, audience reports, analytics intelligence, segmentation, and more. The bestselling, top-rated course has helped thousands of users learn valuable best practices for Google Analytics.

Provider:Udemy

Description:This bestselling Google Analytics course can help beginners improve how they monitor their business performance and identify growth opportunities. Students will learn to create a Google Analytics account, install tracking codes,load demo data, remove internal traffic from reports, explore data segments, use campaign tagging to monitor marketing performance, remove spam traffic, set up custom alerts, and analyze audience, behavior, and acquisition reports. The program is taught by Daragh Walsh, a top-rated instructor who has helped over one million people improve their skills.

Provider:Udemy

Description:With this course, Google Analytics users will have access to almost five hours of video material, over fifty real-world examples, and one-hundred quiz questions to help them learn how the platform works and put their new skills to the test. The course will cover topics like measuring data with Google Analytics, website speed optimization, data segmentation, socio-demo data analysis, UTM parameters, internal site search, and using data to drive meaningful business growth.

William Jepma is an editor, writer, and analyst at Solutions Review who aims to keep readers across industries informed and excited about the newest developments in Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Business Process Management (BPM), and Marketing Automation. You can connect with him on LinkedIn or reach him via email at wjepma@solutionsreview.com.

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The Top Google Analytics Training Courses for Marketers to Take in 2022 - Solutions Review

Confessions of a professional clickbait writer – The Boston Globe

I had no clue what SEO was when I was hired by a Silicon Valley health startup in 2018. But it wasnt long before I understood the value of ranking higher in search engines.

Get Weekend Reads from IdeasA weekly newsletter from the Boston Globe Ideas section, forged at the intersection of 'what if' and 'why not.'

Approximately 75 percent of clicks go to the top three results on search engines. To put that into context, I run a college-student tips website with one of the top-ranking articles for the question How much do college students spend on food? In 2019, my article was the number one search result for that query. That year, 35,339 people read it. In 2021, my article dropped to the bottom of page one, where it hovered between spots eight and 10. The page received only 8,470 views last year, a 76 percent decline.

If I sold a product or service through my website, dropping even eight spots on Google would have lost me 26,869 potential new customers. Ive seen search engine updates affect a companys search rankings so much that they effectively destroyed a five-figure monthly online business overnight.

Today, more businesses than ever before rely heavily on SEO to get their products in front of new eyes. Because its viewed as a long-term growth strategy, companies are investing more resources than ever in SEO. Heres why this is troubling: Companies that have access to expensive SEO artificial intelligence tools and the funds to pay freelance writers often outcompete true experts who lack such resources. Its a numbers game: The more an entity is willing to spend, the greater the likelihood that its information accurate or not ends up at the top of search engines. Ask yourself: How often do you look for the answer you seek on the second page or even the bottom of the first page of search results?

Access to the top of page one on Google, like life in many of Americas cities, is becoming less affordable every day.

The artifice of SEO

Being an SEO writer is an exercise in imagination. Im a city dweller whos never owned a home, yet I pay my rent by writing home improvement articles. I once wrote a Christian book review right after writing about language hacks that men can use to pick up women. Im a former physical education teacher with expired personal training credentials, yet from 2018 to 2021, I wrote hundreds of health articles.

When clients ask me to conduct research before writing an article, the instructions are usually pretty simple: See what the top articles are doing, and do it better.

Better, Ive come to understand, doesnt mean more factual or presented with more compelling statistics. The client wants me to reiterate what the top-ranking websites have already said. By peppering in terms related to the topic that people might search for, its not hard to make poached words sound like my own.

I try in earnest to create original, well-sourced content. Yet Id be silly not to cherry- pick ideas from pages that, according to Google, are winning the rankings game. Im not paid to write beautiful prose; Im paid to grab eyeballs.

But for freelancers working for SEO content farms who churn out a dozen or more articles per day, the research standards are far lower. Its about a paycheck. A Google spokesperson told me that the search engine identifies and penalizes spam and scraped content, but I regularly spot reshuffled sentences, if not outright plagiarism, on the first page of Google search results.

Recently, I attended an SEO Lunch and Learn Zoom call for a marketing agency I write for. Showing us the back end of the agencys Google Analytics page, the marketing director clicked on a company whose website was getting about 100,000 monthly views.

This article receives about 20,000 clicks each month, he boasted of a piece written by a freelancer but bearing the CEOs byline.

[He] doesnt even know his company has a blog, the marketing director said, referring to the CEO and laughing.

This is another thing about SEO. Companies get a great return on their investment by paying an unknown freelancer to write a piece that the CEOs name will go on.

Author authority is good for SEO, youll hear. But if that blog has 100,000 monthly readers and the CEO hasnt written any of its content, is that really author authority? What if everyone did it that way?

The thing is, many companies do.

To sum up the game of SEO-upmanship: Freelance writers, cheaper than actual experts, get paid to write things that are way out of their wheelhouse. If they follow basic SEO principles, their articles especially ones bearing the name of someone well known can rank high in search engines.

The kicker is that the reason people invest in SEO in the first place to get new visitors and potential customers to their website may soon be gone. Consider Googles content-snippet feature that previews answers and the FAQ accordion box that pops up before the first search result. With each of these tools, Google tries to answer your question before you even have to click on any of the search results.

If you find the answer to your question without ever leaving Google, the companies paying for SEO-optimized content lose money. Once the information middleman, Google is morphing into an information landing page. This is one reason you often have to scroll through so many ads before you get to the information youre looking for. Googles revenue from search-related advertising was $149 billion in 2021.

A cog in the SEO machine

For some time I havent felt great about the work Im doing. I may spend my workday writing, but Im not writing for artistic expression. Im marketing my words to a search engine. In that sense, Im more of a literary salesman than a writer, using industry-standard sentence structure and similar tactics to sell Googles algorithm on my product.

In addition to the spread of low-quality, zero-accountability information online, I wonder if SEO harms us in other, subtler ways. Its entirely possible that the mental health crisis in America is being exacerbated by our efforts to fix complex life problems with Seven Simple Steps how-to articles. Even though a lot of us know these bullet-pointed formats are superficial, theyre great for SEO.

I used to think of Google as the information superhighway an unbiased resource where you could go to find the best answers to your questions, ranked in terms of quality. This is not to say that Google turns a blind eye; the spokesperson said that the company believes its cut in half the number of irrelevant results on searches over the past seven years. Even so, I have come to believe that Googles primacy as the default search engine comes at the expense of quality information.

Something happened recently that put a finer point on that concern.

While eating lunch, I found myself wondering about something. Like most of us do, I Googled it. I clicked the top result and read the majority of the article, only to be completely shocked when I reached the bottom of the page and saw the image in the author box.

It was a picture of my face. The article said Written by Ben Kissam.

Ive written so many articles on topics Im not qualified to write about that I accidentally learned something from an article I wrote.

Ben Kissam is a writer and stand-up comedian in Denver. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram @benkissam.

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Confessions of a professional clickbait writer - The Boston Globe

Track teams out of the starting blocks | Local | rutlandherald.com – Rutland Herald

The Fair Haven Union High School track and field team is opening the season in style on Saturday at the Empire Arsenal Relays in Watervliet, New York.

It is a great way to start a season, Fair Haven coach Jon Oakman said.

Rutland will kick off its season on April 12 with a home meet on its eight-lane rack at Alumni Field.

Oakman and his assistant Randy Shutter expect the strength of the Fair Haven girls squad will be the middle distance events led by the likes of Isabella Carrara, Ava Shull and Ella Kuehn.

The boys strength figures to be in the throwing events.

We have some big strong throwers, Shutter said.

Most will throw in all three events the shot put, discus and javelin.

Leading the way are Dave Doran, Cooper Spaulding, Nate Young, Caden Lynch, Kole Matta, Patrick Stone and Mason Williams.

Luke Williams will be taking aim at the school record in the long jump that was set by his brother Evan Williams at 21-4, established in 2019.

He also could be one of the top triple jumpers in Division II, Shutter said.

The D-II State Meet will be at U-32 in East Montpelier.

I think we could have a few (winning state titles), Shutter said.

Kuehn and Carrara are confident that they could be part of some relay units that could do big things.

I have been part of relay teams for four years. I see a lot of hard working underclassmen on the relay teams this year, Carrara said.

Since we have all played soccer together in the fall, I think we have a lot of chemistry and and I think we can be successful, Kuehn said.

A highlight of the Slaters hefty 21-meet schedule will be a large invitational hosted by Niskayuna High School in New York State. The Slaters will be going to several meets in the Glens Falls-Albany area.

Other boys on the squad include Phil Bean, Noah Beayon, Riley Buckley, Reilly Flanders, Emmett MacKay, Sulivan OBrien, Cole Oakman, Konner Savage, Kaylo Stevenson and Nikolai Wook.

Others on the girls squad are Aunnika Brannock, Julia Carrara, Olivia Charron, Abi Fowler, Ash Kennett, Vivian Ladabouche, Ayame Merkel, Madison Perry, Allison Rogers, Katarina Stevens and Alexandra Williams.

GREEN MT.Green Mountain coach Angela Hutchins wont be short on senior leadership with 13 members of that class across the boys and girls teams: Ryan Colburn, Aiden Farrar, Miles Garvin, Jordan Harper, Evan Hayes, Jaden Holden, Jayden Hinkle, Everett Mosher, Mitchell Rounds, Jackson Ruhlin, Elias Stowell-Aleman, Eva Svec and Grace Tyrrell.

Juniors include Greta Bernier, Josh Buckley, Luna Burkland, Berkley Hutchins, Marlayna King, Eben Mosher and Ben Munukka.

The lone sophomore is Noah Cherubini and freshmen are Kyra Burbela and Joa Gibson.

Mill River coach Brandon Ryan has a small team but it has members capable of making plenty of waves this season when the Minutemen open the season on April 12 at Fair Haven.

You can start with senior Annika Heintz who is defending her three individual state titles. The elite distance runner in coming off an outstanding cross country season and a good winter training regimen.

Ryan said the team has others who could turn heads this year.

We have a lot of surprises in the bag that I think will shock Vermont, he said.

One of those is Mount St. Josephs Leah Majorell who is training with the Mill River team.

The girls team is comprised of seniors Faith Murray and Heintz, junior Malorie Tarbell, sophomores Majorell and Claire Morris and freshman Willa Seo.

Leah Majorell has a lot of untapped potential, Ryan said.

Ethan Foley is the lone member of the boys squad.

I come into my first year as Mill Rivers track and field coach as optimistic. We have a small team but with very promising members, Ryan said.

When Rutland unveils its team for the home fans at Alumni Field, the Raiders could be strong in the distance events with top female runners from the cross country team like Helen Culpo and Erin Geisler as well as Brady Geisler, Karver Butler Owen Dube-Johnson and Sam Kay on the boys squad.

The potential of the distance runners has to excite coach Mike Audette, himself an elite runner at Catholic University in Washington, D.C.

The girls team is comprised of Calle Alexander, Sophie Boulette, Isabel Crossman, Culpo, Geisler, Raynna Hanlon, Makenna Houston, Makenna Hubert, Dierdre Lillie, Jenna Montgomery, Kailey Murray, Jillian Perry, Ava Rosi, Emelia Sabataso, Bethany Solari, Evangeline Taylor, Emily Wigmore and Emma Worton.

The boys team includes Abed Alawi, Butler, Dube-Johnson, William Fuller, Brycen Gandin, Geisler, Aiden Good, Sam and Joshua Kay, Coletan Lapham, Jahmalie Mckenzie, Tyler Messer, Logan Mormando, Slade Postemski, Hank Potter, Brock Quinlan, Matthew Reveal, Eli Rosi, William Sabataso, Brayden Shelton, Lane Shelton, Finnian Smathers and Marko Svoren.

There has been a trend at Springfield of athletes doing a couple of sports in the spring, baseball and softball players competing on the track and field team.

Baseball player Sam Presch is one of those.

He was kind of the pioneer of that, Cosmos track and field coach Jim Fog said.

Presch was third in the 400 meters at the State Meet last year and he is one of several baseball players that Fog expects to see.

Chris Jeffers is a senior in his fourth year on the team and is also strong in the 400.

Tim Amsden is a 300-meter hurdler and Aidan Donahue could perform well in the throws.

I coached him in football. He is big and strong. He could be one who steps up, Fog said.

Alicia Ostrom, a strong cross country runner, will be counted on as a leader of the girls 4X800 relay unit as well as being strong in distance events.

Liz Loney will be counted on for points in the girls javelin event.

Ari Cioffi, a softball player, could have success in the throwing events.

Damian Stagner and Dylan Magoon are both strong distance runners on the boys side.

The West Rutland girls will be led by the reigning Division IV state shot put champion Isabel Lanfear. She also finished second in the javelin at the State Meet.

She will also compete in the 100-meter hurdles and might try the high jump, coach Dillon Zaengle said.

Her sister Abigail Lanfear will compete in the triple jump, long jump and shot put.

The boys will have Jaden Jarrosak representing the Golden Horde in the 100 meters, 400 meters and long jump.

He moved back from Agawam, Massachusetts at the beginning of the school year and Zaengle considers that a windfall.

JJ Clemmons is a returning senior who will be competing in the shot put, discus and possibly the long jump.

Colby Perry is taking on the shot put, discus and potentially the 100 meters.

Sophomore Quincy Senecal is tackling the high jump, 100 meters, 100-meter relay and long jump.

Tristan Rocke, who flashed his speed on the soccer field, will showcase it in the 100, 400 and 800.

Freshman Charlie Duncan will be in the shot put and discus events.

Our goal is to get everyone qualified for at least one event in the State Meet, Zaengle said.

A highlight of the schedule, that begins on April 12 at Fair Haven, will be a trip to the Windsor Invitational.

I am excited about some of the newcomers because we are trying to grow the program, Zaengle said.

NOTES: The State Meets will be the weekend of June 3-4. ... Oakman said the turnout of 40 athletes in the Fair Haven program is low. The Slaters numbered in the 70s several years ago. ... The Jerry Jasinski Vermont State Decathlon Meet will be June 13-14 at Burlington High School.

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Track teams out of the starting blocks | Local | rutlandherald.com - Rutland Herald