SEO Checklist 2014 – For New Websites

Transcript of Video by Martin Astern @ http://bit.ly/1tnSmeG

1. Create Google account and email address for your site (not necessary but makes things easier)
2. Install Google Analytics
3. Install Google Webmaster Tools
4. Install Bing Webmaster Tools
5. For WordPress: install Google Analytics for WordPress and SEO for WordPress (these plugins will make your life 100x easier)
6. Check Google Webmaster Tools for 404/500 errors, duplicate content, missing titles, and other technical errors that Google has found; make sure to keep up with any messages Google is sending you
7. Use Browseo to find even more technical errors; the most common detrimental errors people tend to make are 302 redirects that should be 301 redirects
8. Use Xenu to find any broken links you might have (free and easy way to check)
9. Use Google’s Keyword Research Tool; be sure to consider searcher intent and difficulty; pick 1 keyword per page and you’ll generally want to start with lower-volume keywords first
10. Look at competitor link profiles; this is the easiest way to get started with link building; you can see what kind of anchor text they’re using, as well as how and where they’ve been getting their links; input competitor domains at Link Diagnosis, Open Site Explorer, Ahrefs, Majestic SEO, and LipperHey
11.  Incorporate your primary keyword (or something close) into your page URL
12. All title tags should be ~65 characters or less; anything longer will be truncated in results; all meta description tags should be ~155 characters or less for same reason
13. Use an H1 tag, utilizing a keyword in the tag; It should be before any (H2, H3, H4,…) tags
14. Start off-page optimization and begin building links; this is the hardest, most important aspect of SEO; see “ClickMinded Link Building Strategy Guide” to get started
15. Assure that all text is search engine-accessible; at least 100 words, because you want to give search engines an opportunity to understand what the topic of your page is; you can still rank with less and never want unnecessary text on site, so only create a page when you’ve got ~100 words worth of content
16. Use synonyms in your copy; synonyms are great, and using natural language that’s influenced by keyword research (rather than just pure keywords) is highly encouraged
17. Images must have descriptive ALT tags and filenames; search engines “see” images by reading the ALT tag and looking at file names, among other factors; try to be descriptive when you name your images, but don’t overdo it
18. Link to internal pages in an SEO-friendly way; describe the page you’re linking to in the anchor text, so that both users and search engines understand what it’s about; don’t use anchor text in your global navigation because it can look over-optimized; stick to in-content links instead
19. Use absolute URLs in your code; some CMS platforms give you the option (use absolute URLs instead of relative ones)
20. Check site speed with Google Page Speed Tools
21. Create XML sitemap and submit it to Google and Ping Webmaster Tools; use XML-sitemaps.com or the Google XML Sitemaps WordPress Plugin
22. Create a Robots.txt file and submit it on Google and Bing Webmaster Tools
23. Assure site is mobile-friendly; check it on multiple browsers with BrowserStack
24. Set up social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+ at the minimum
25. Claim your business/website username on other major networks for reputation management reseaons; not only do you want to make sure no one else gets your account name, but you can often “own” all the results on the first page of a search for your brand if you’re a new website or company; here is the URL structure of the major networks (note: these may change over time):
    1. http://www.twitter.com/brandname
    2. http://www.facebook.com/brandname
    3. http:// youtube .com/user/brandname
    4. http://www.yelp .com/biz/brand-name
    5. http://www.linkedin.com/in/brand-name
    6. http://brand-name.wordpress.com/
    7. http://brand-name.tumblr.com/
    8. http://pinterest.com/brand-name/
    9. http://www.hulu.com/profiles/brand-name
    10. http://technorati.com/people/brand-name
    11. http://about.me/brandname
    12. http://brandname.posterous.com/
    13. http://profile.typepad.com/brandname
    14. http://www.squidoo.com/lensmasters/brand-name
    15. http://www.stumbleupon.com/stumbler/brandname
    16. http://www.etsy.com/people/brandname
    17. http://en.gravatar.com/brandname
    18. http://www.scribd.com/brand-name
    19. http://brand-name.livejournal.com/
    20. http://brandname.hubpages.com/
    21. http://www.flickr.com/photos /brandname/
    22. http://photobucket.com/user.brand-name/profile/
26. Add Authorship Markup to your site; use the “Authorship Markup Walkthrough”
27. Use the MetaFever SEO On-Page Optimization Report to double-check everything once you’re live
28. Review all of the free SEO tools at your disposal before completing the audit

Don’t Burn Bridges, but Don’t Kiss Ass

On a daily basis each of us is confronted with the agendas of people and situations that challenge our gut instinct, and ultimately lead us to respond in ways we never would, had we been operating in a vacuum void of judgement.  Unfortunately, we don’t exist in a social vacuum, making things quite messy along the way to success.

Quite simply put, success is within our own being, and life merely is a challenge to examine oneself in the search for esteem, will, and perseverance.  We each hold our own key to happiness of self and those around us, and must learn that in order to obtain said key, we must at times go against the grain, regardless of any perceived consequences.  Why worry about something that hasn’t happened?  You’d be better off wasting your time and energy doing nothing at all.

In this society built on fear, we have been programmed (intentionally or unintentionally, by capitalistic societal evolution) to internalize that fear and let it guide our actions.  No individual can possibly be happy nor can they achieve true success personally or professionally when living according to this protocol.

Be yourself, be aware, and challenge the world around you; you have only to gain in every aspect from it.  If you screw up?  Lesson learned, lesson internalized, and lesson applied to all  future actions!

 

 

Step 1: Welcome to yeSEO Blog!

Welcome, and thank you for visiting! Far too often, novice entrepreneurs and small business owners are inspired to build their businesses upon the foundation of an idea, before, first, considering the potential market of a service or product resulting from that idea.  This strategy may work for some lucky individuals, but in most cases, it simply leads the owning firm of that idea down a dark and mysterious path, from which returning proves to be extremely difficult, if not impossible.

Don’t let this fact kill your creativity, however, as constant innovation is necessary to survive in today’s global business environment, regardless of the industry in which you work or of the markets that you serve.

In creating yeSEO Consulting, I intend to share with you all of the entrepreneurial, business marketing wisdom I obtain along the way, as well as answer any inquiries you may have concerning your own business venture(s) to the best of my ability.

Some of the topics that will be covered include social media strategy, search engine optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), media buying, and branding for business.  Please join me in this effort by sharing any feedback you may have.

I hope to see this blog evolve into an open forum, and invite those who master these techniques to contribute any content that encourages mutual growth for all readers.

I formally welcome you to this blog, appreciate very much your involvement, and look forward to the collaboration of those interested in creating the best businesses possible!  With synergy comes infinite success!

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