Category Archives: SEO

Posts Specifically Related to SEO

SEO Zen in 2010

Growing Tree

It didn’t seem possible, but the dust has finally settled, and in 2009 Jtree.net experienced over 50% growth compared to 2008. Prospering during an economic downturn was no easy chore. It took long hours, dedication, education and wouldn’t have been possible without talented staff, partners and incredible clients.

Our stellar search engine rankings for our own website in 2009 continued with helping not only drive new business and growth, but with reinforcing our reputation for being able to dominate organic search results for a given market niche.

Twitter Philo to Continue

We have a fairly unique Twitter philosophy that is employed with our @JtreeSEO Twitter account. We follow back only after being followed. Period. No sketchy following thousands of people in hopes of a follow-back, or any auto-DMs for that matter either. Online marketers have a bad enough rep on Twitter to begin with. We think it’s been a success nonetheless, check out our follower graph below.

Hit the Ground Running

For the culmination of 2009 we unveiled a brand new Jtree.net website, expanded service offerings and rolled-out fresh blog posts as a warm-up to 2010. Almost immediately, we plan to reveal a brand new logo to complete the Jtree.net branding experience.

Cosmetic issues aside, our new Off-Page SEO service offering is something you won’t find anywhere else. We’ve always been a few steps ahead, so this should come as no surprise.

Off-Page SEO is geared for obtaining instant and ongoing quality backlinks for your website or blog for 12 months. It’s designed to reinforce your online reputation in the search engines without having to pay for every click.

Connect with us to get started or learn more.

Happy Holidays – Best Wishes for 2010 from Jtree.net!

Page Load Speed HUGE SE Ranking Criteria in 2010

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Article by Jtree.net; a Boise SEO and PPC Internet Marketing company.

Does Your Site Go … Too Slow?

His Site Loads Slow When Google posts about something that could be a major factor about how web pages are ranked, it’s always a good idea to listen. When Google blogs, releases news, speaks on camera and blogs some more about the same thing – it’s time to do more than just take note.

Just like the fuzz, the big “G” typically likes to warn us before a smack-down is coming. In this case, it’s a potential Search Engine rankings smack-down.

In a nutshell; G-unit is telling us that slow websites could soon be ranked lower regardless of other factors like number of quality backlinks and other On-Page SEO factors. They have even provided a site performance tool for testing any website you have added to Google Webmaster Tools. What this tool does is show how fast your site (or blog) loads in comparison to other sites/blogs, in addition to some tips (not always useful) to increase load-times.

Note: Once in Google Webmaster Tools, click on a website, then click on ‘Labs’ (left-column) and finally ‘Site Performance’ to use Google’s Site Performance tool.

Google allows you take it a few steps further by providing access to their open-source anti-latency tool AKA Page Speed. A Firebug/Firefox extension that runs several best practice tests on your web server (the physical location where your site is stored) and front end code. Page Speed takes a deeper look at issues related to the overall load-times of your website and provides suggestions for increasing speed.

If you’re not into the Google tools, you’re in luck. Here’s another tool that tests your page speed. This tool can help you identify slow loading items for removal, and is a little more useful than Google’s site performance tool in terms of identifying items that can easily be removed or streamlined.

Benefits of Increasing Site Speed

The obvious – not having it work against you in the form of ranking penalties
Bandwidth Efficiency – the faster your site loads reduces the amount of bandwidth required to load it (lower web hosting cost)
Usability – site visitors like fast loading websites; helps increase stickiness and decrease bounce-rates
Environmental – faster, more efficient websites increase the efficiency and resource management of the world wide web as a whole

If you’ve noticed site speed issues by using the tools above, give us a shout, we’ve been successfully speeding-up web content for businesses for over a decade.

Find Out Who Links to Your Site with the SEO Backlink Checker Tool

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Why Backlinks?

Oldskool Backlink Checkers Backlinks are linky votes of confidence, and are core to any serious SEO campaign. Backlinks represent links from other websites that point to your site, and are very important in regard to how well your website or blog ranks in the search engines. The more quality backlinks a site has translates into better search engine rankings… in a nutshell.

Backlink Intel

Google typically only reveals LESS THAN 1% of the actual backlinks for your site that they are giving you credit for.
Yahoo! typically only reveals LESS THAN 5% of the actual backinks for your site.

The main reason why backlink sources are not revealed is simple; Blackhat SEOs can use that information for shady intentions. All the more reason to hire a professional SEO; which have the tools to track backlinks beyond what is readily available to the general public, and experience to formulate viable Off-Page SEO strategy. Plus, we tend to have a ‘knack’ for knowing all of the good places to get ‘juicy’ backlinks. 🙂

Backlink Checker Tool

Curious about who’s linking to your website or blog? Use the backlink checker tool below to find out. Note: Pay close attention to the PageRank of backlink locations (URLs), this is a quality indicator of the site linking to you. Generally speaking, you want backlinks from websites that have a higher PageRank than your own site or blog. You can check your PageRank here.

Tip! Enter your competitor’s website address to find out where they are getting backlinks from.

Tip! Enter your Twitter, YouTube, Facebook Fan Page or other social network profile URL to find out if people are linking to you.

Interested in Off-Page SEO (aka acquiring quality backlinks)? Contact us with questions or to get started!

SEO Hiring Guide

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A good SEO is worth every penny. Getting a website to rank on competitive keyphrases is a very difficult task which requires an ongoing effort from an experienced SEO. If your business depends on the web, ranking well for keyphrases that potential customers will use to find you is crucial to your ROI.

Everyone claims to be an SEO these days. Web design/development companies and consultants are hastily adding it to their service roster, despite having any real clue as to what SEO really is. Marketing and Brand Management agencies have done the same, adopting a technology they know little about.

That leaves the SEOs themselves… the consultants and companies fully devoted to SEO, PPC and Social Marketing. Many of which drop the ball on keyphrase targeting, monitoring and/or reporting. SEO is so much more than just marketing. It requires a fundamental understanding of the technology that powers the web.

I recently posted about how to hire an SEO that can actually rank on SEOBoise.com. Consider reading it if you have even the slightest interest in SEO, especially if you or your company is considering hiring an SEO.

The 6 rules below are designed to help thin the crowd when searching for a knowledgeable SEO.

Google Them.
Portfolio Availability.
Under the Hood Optimization.
Backlinks. Backlinks. Backlinks.
Competing Clients.
Who Does What.

Click here to read the complete post >

Josh (the post author) is the founder of and consultant for Jtree.net; a Boise, Idaho based SEO, PPC and Social Internet Marketing consulting firm that has provided services to over 50 companies and agencies over the last 10 years.