How can I get to the top of yahoo

[lovely]

Hello,

How can I get to the top of yahoo? I know that to get to the top of google and MSN one need to have a high rated/good keyword, frequently update of site, link to high quality site and others, but I think yahoo case is different.
Regards,
Lovely

 

[clau]

Hello Lovely,

Nobody realy knows how to get on top in any serach engine. I guess that only the guys from Google knows exactly what to do with your site to be in the first x. And they are constantly changing things adding more and more variables to the formula.

Anyway, I hope you will find the answer and you will tell it to us.

Claudiu

 

[temi]

But there are a few basic steps that would get your site to the top of Yahoo, google and most other search engines, here are just a few:
Good Quality and unique contents (just another web design site, or another forum like all other forum is not that unique)
Excellent internal link structure
Inbound links from quality site (not from link far, low quality web directory etc)
and many more which other more experienced SEO expert can add to this list

 

[OldWelshGuy]

Unique page titles
Solid hierachael folder structure
clearly defined niches within the folders
good use of anchor text in links (internal and external)
link out to quality resources from within your body copy (on topic and as tight as possible)
Good balance of inbound links (hunderds of directories and nothing else will not help you enough)
Focused content.
Balanced weighting ont he page
Clean code that validates or as near as damnit.
structured pages
Place a cabbage on top of your monitor
Only wear pink on Tuesdays!
Send me money

(1 of the last three is true, two are false)

 

[temi]

One of cool OWG post, will turn this to a sticky so that its easy to find in future

 

[Jess]

HHmm I thought you had to place the cabbage on top of your computer whilst wearing pink on tuesdays .... I didn't realise it was an option

 

[OldWelshGuy]

HHmm I thought you had to place the cabbage on top of your computer whilst wearing pink on tuesdays .... I didn't realise it was an option

jess be careful, if you do both you might trip a spam filter. Then again cabbage and spam is a good meal

 

[lovely]

Thanks everyone, my main target is yahoo. I have a site that is on top of google and 3rd on MSN but is not evern in top 20 of yahoo, so I think there is another method to get to the top of yahoo.

 

[OldWelshGuy]

Lovely, if you want it in plain English here goes.

Yahoo prefers on page optimisation with clean code Header tags h1, h2 h3., etc. It places more weight on keywords in the url, and prefers a far higher level of keyword saturation and prominance.

MSN & Goole on the other hand place more weight on off page links than Yahoo. This (IMO without looking) is why you are ranking on G &MSN but not yahoo, your pages are not optimised, you have just focused on getting links.

Please correct me if I am wrong, and feel free to post the site in question.

I am not sure where this 'optimising for diffferent search engines' thing comes from really I don't. ALL search engines want the same thing, they want clean sites that can be understood as easily as possible by focused pages and navigation. The only difference is Google (&MSN to a point) as these prefer the above, but also want inbound links to work with.

 

[dmscs]

I am not sure where this 'optimising for diffferent search engines' thing comes from really I don't. ALL search engines want the same thing, they want clean sites that can be understood as easily as possible by focused pages and navigation. The only difference is Google (&MSN to a point) as these prefer the above, but also want inbound links to work with.

OWG is so right. You have to ensure that you use standards compliant code. Visit the w3c.org and check out their HTML validator. Put your website address in and see if you have any errors. Common errors include no <DOCTYPE> and ampersand errors.

Next you need to make sure that your content is the highest quality you can afford, be it through an expenditure of time or the use of a copywriter. Points to consider is the identification of keywords which may be used to search for your product or services. But please bear in mind this is not the be all and end all of Search Engineering. Keywords are often sold by Search Engineering firms as a part of their sales process, for example they will offer you 5 keywords or keyword phrases for x amount of money. When really what you should be concerned with is the optimisation and search engineering of your whole website.

Use an xml sitemap and get it registered with Google. This will also show errors on your website and recent search phrases that people have used with Google to get to your website. I understand that Yahoo do a version of sitemaps with a .txt file this might be worth considering.

Be patient, they actually will get to you if you have the right links in the right place. So look to develop some quality links, that are relevent to your website. As Temi says, list on some SEO friendly directories, dont worry too much about the directories page rank, if it is a new one and has a page rank of 0 it might be tomorrows PR6?

More Importantly!!!
Try not to get too concerned about being on the top of SERPS! Your website is not about results on search engines. It is about traffic and conversion. The search engine results are all fine if you are getting adequate traffic and it is converting to sales or calls, but if you have x amount of unique visits and your website is not converting, then you need to worry about your website first.

Altering your website for conversion is something many SEO firms do not consider. SEO is a marketing business, its about conversion and maximum impact, something that search enigineering to 5 keywords does not cover anymore!

Thats my input! Good luck! If you need more help then we are here.

 

[OldWelshGuy]

I really hate the term SEO as it is so yesterdays word. A GOOD web marketing company should
1. carry out extensive keyword research (i regularly end up with a few hundred phrases for a small site, shopping carts can have thousands)
2. run a PPC campaign to be used as part of the keyword research and also as a fall back/kick start to the site.
3. overhaul the site structure and arrange a redesign if needed.
4. ensure no traffic is lost by using redirects (301) from old pages to new.
5. ensure the site validates
6. ensure the copy is well written or re-written
7. ensure the site is designed to maximise conversions
8. ensure usability best practices are employed
9. ensure the site complies with the current laws (8 out of 10 site possibly higher do not)
10. most importantly, ensure the site has no technical reason for not working, such as slow server, poorly set up server, use of frames, use of bad dynamic urls, use of poorly constructed query strings on dynamic sites, content hidden too deep in nested tables etc.
There are many many more, and these are just off the top of my head.

Too many snake oil salesmen that call themselves SEO's operate online. They do not have a clue about stats packages, the workings of the algorithms, how search engines and directories work, usability, accessibility, conversion tracking, maximising conversions, or anything else. ALL they know is how to get backlinks to a site, and bomb it to the top of the search engines. This is hardly optimisation is it!

Optimisation is taking something to its optimum, optimum quality, optimum ranking, optimum conversion, THAT is search engine marketing. Encompassing all the aspects of marketing online. NOT just getting a bag of bones to number one on the search engines.

If you want to know the sort of difference high quality work can make, this is what happened to a client we took on this time last year.

They were a shoestring S3x toy site, turning over £4000 a month, mostly through PPC (the rest was offline marketing and repeat business). I worked with the owner, who did the design and donkey work, and within 6 months the site was making £10,000 a week! conversions were optimum, and the average sales value had shot up as we used prompts to encourage the visitor to spend more via offers and package deals. Repeat business sky rocketed due to email marketing. I better stop now as I am ranting LOL, and I have to be up early in the morning as we are off to London to see the lights being turned on in Trafalgar square over the weekend, climb the monument, and visit Hamleys, the V&A plus the Natural history museum. (Lottie my 6 yr old has set the itinerary)

 

[lovely]

Thanks everyone for the million naira advise , there is no need to consulting any SEO or A GOOD web marketing company because OldWelshGuy have said it all. If I can work on each of the about points it will help a lot but I still need to study how yahoo search engines work and to prepare my site for it. It is very difficult to be on top of yahoo.

Kind regards,
Lovely

 

[OldWelshGuy]

there is no need to consulting any SEO or A GOOD web marketing company because OldWelshGuy have said it all.

You did get a good consulting company, you got me for free

but I still need to study how yahoo search engines work and to prepare my site for it. It is very difficult to be on top of yahoo.

What like the second place site here you mean. http://search.yahoo.com/search?ei=utf-8&fr=slv1-&p=web+design+wales our site actually just moved off the top a week or two ago. this other site have moved us off. As we no longer do web deign I really don't care. The site is about mid 30's on Google. and top 3 on MSN. a couple more links will se it top on Google, but I don't really want it there, and only use the site for testing purposes really.

 

[Jwaltz]

Unique page titles
Solid hierachael folder structure
clearly defined niches within the folders
good use of anchor text in links (internal and external)
link out to quality resources from within your body copy (on topic and as tight as possible)
Good balance of inbound links (hunderds of directories and nothing else will not help you enough)
Focused content.
Balanced weighting ont he page
Clean code that validates or as near as damnit.
structured pages
Place a cabbage on top of your monitor
Only wear pink on Tuesdays!
Send me money

(1 of the last three is true, two are false)

Wearing pink on tuesday and cabbage on top of the monitor is working on google...but not on Yahoo I am desperate to get on top in yahoo ..should i place a banna on top of the monitor and wear black/green yellow on tuesday?? Help me understand yahoo algorythms if u can thnx

 

[OldWelshGuy]

Yahoo likes keywords in the URL.