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Most of my Internet Marketing clients always ask the same questions: Where is my site? My keywords are easy, why am I not ranked? Why am I always outranked by site X? Here are the answers to all of these questions and more.

What makes a site rank higher than another one

Google currently uses over 200 criteria to determine where your site should fit into their rankings. They use a combination of your sites authority, links, and several other metrics. For each search term, Google assigns a ranking based on all criteria. Your on-page optimization could be absolutely perfect, but if you don’t have quality inbound links chances are you will not rank well for an even moderately competitive keyword.

Search Terms

Often I get approached by a client that sells watches, for example. Of course, most watch store owners want to rank high for the word “watches”. It is always difficult to explain to the client that their site is simply not going to be #1 for this keyword. The cost involved with attacking an extremely competitive keyword is always just too much for any small or medium sized business.

It is always much better to target more specific keywords. It may be better to go after the watch maker or even the model #. Indeed, if the client really feels that the keyword watches is the only way to go, this plan will put us on that path. This way the client receives traffic everyday until the main keyword climbs to the top.

One more quick thought on keyword selection. The keyword difficulty and value are meaningless if people are not searching for the keyword. Often customers “know” what their users are searching for to find them. After a bit of research, it may be determined that absolutely nobody searched for that keyword in the previous month on Google. All the optimization in the world will not make you a nickel!

Why bother with Search Engine Marketing

Some cliens look at the Internet in the wrong way. They try to compare it to traditional marketing methods. People that are still living in the 80’s actually think the best marketing they can do is the local yellow pages. They still believe that when a guy buys a watch he fires up the 2000 page book and finds a jewelry store. The best customer is the world is a customer that knows exactly what he/she wants. When you go to the grocery store to buy a can of soup, you ARE going to buy a can of soup. You will always buy, no matter what. The same can be said for a customer that is searching for a very specific product. When the client searches for something very specific, he already made up his mind. If he clicks on your link and you have the product, the sale is totally up to your price, terms and delivery options. This man is not shopping for a “watch” he is shopping for SPC011.