In my industry (traditional marketing), intellectual property is fiercely guarded. Not so in the web world.
Open source is a term you will see a lot when you start searching for answers to web development and SEO questions. The simple definition of it is "free stuff." But it's really more than that.
In the world of web, there are many talented individuals (mostly developers) who are happy to share the programs they've developed for free. Sure, they may have a donation button so you can give something back, but they'll still help you out if you don't.
Open source is good for you. With just a little time on your part to search, you can find tools to help with your web site and with your SEO efforts.
My great venison cooking site is built using Joomla, an open source content management system. I've used free extensions for everything: Gary's cookbook for the recipes, JoomSEF for my search engine friendly urls, jumi coder for writing custom scripts in the articles, and more (those are the primary ones).
The generosity of these developers has allowed me to build a content-rich web site that I (with study and practice) can easily optimize for search engine marketing. And that means more visitors, and hopefully some serious revenue from my Amazon Store.
Future posts will go into more detail on all the free help you can find on-line. It's amazing what is out there if you're just willing to look for it.
Showing posts with label search engine optimization. Show all posts
Showing posts with label search engine optimization. Show all posts
Saturday, September 12, 2009
The Small Business SEO Project
My name is Susan and I own a couple of small businesses. None of them are in the field of web development or search engine marketing. That's a shame, because one of my business relies on the Internet for about 80% of our new clients.
Over the course of a few years, my husband and I figured out a lot about search engine optimization (SEO) on our own, and watched our organic search rankings rise. We felt pretty good about our efforts.
Then we decided to form an association. We knew that to be successful, we would need to have a solid search engine marketing plan. We also knew, based on what we'd learned on our own, that we didn't know enough to launch a national SEO campaign. So, we did what smart people do, we quote quotes from people who do know what they're doing.
It's important to note I got quote from people who knew what they were doing. There are a lot of people selling SEO who don't know what they're doing. You can waste a lot of money going the cheap route. Don't do it.
Unfortunately, good SEO from people who are good is very expensive. Cost prohibitive for our start up. And, honestly, at the time I didn't understand why it was so expensive.
So, I did what I do. I decided to figure it out myself. I figured if I read and researched enough, I could at least get us started. (I want to note here that one of my businesses is marketing related. I have a good working knowledge of the industry, so it wasn't a total stretch for me to take this on.)
Where does that put me today? Six months of intense research later, I've learned some things. I'm still learning. I understand why the good SEO is expensive! I've started this blog to share what I've learned...and continue to learn with other small business owners. You may decide to hire someone to do it for you, but my hope is that you'll learn enough from my experiences to know what you're buying.
We haven't launched the association yet. But I've been testing my knowledge on my hobby website, http://greatvenisoncooking.com, which I launched at the end of August. I'll share tips and tricks...and the results of my efforts along the way!
Over the course of a few years, my husband and I figured out a lot about search engine optimization (SEO) on our own, and watched our organic search rankings rise. We felt pretty good about our efforts.
Then we decided to form an association. We knew that to be successful, we would need to have a solid search engine marketing plan. We also knew, based on what we'd learned on our own, that we didn't know enough to launch a national SEO campaign. So, we did what smart people do, we quote quotes from people who do know what they're doing.
It's important to note I got quote from people who knew what they were doing. There are a lot of people selling SEO who don't know what they're doing. You can waste a lot of money going the cheap route. Don't do it.
Unfortunately, good SEO from people who are good is very expensive. Cost prohibitive for our start up. And, honestly, at the time I didn't understand why it was so expensive.
So, I did what I do. I decided to figure it out myself. I figured if I read and researched enough, I could at least get us started. (I want to note here that one of my businesses is marketing related. I have a good working knowledge of the industry, so it wasn't a total stretch for me to take this on.)
Where does that put me today? Six months of intense research later, I've learned some things. I'm still learning. I understand why the good SEO is expensive! I've started this blog to share what I've learned...and continue to learn with other small business owners. You may decide to hire someone to do it for you, but my hope is that you'll learn enough from my experiences to know what you're buying.
We haven't launched the association yet. But I've been testing my knowledge on my hobby website, http://greatvenisoncooking.com, which I launched at the end of August. I'll share tips and tricks...and the results of my efforts along the way!
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