Search Engine Optimization Software

Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, has changed a bit since I first started in the field back in 2001.

Google’s prominence has grown to stellar height, and both Yahoo! and MSN are still trying to catch up. Ways to trick the search engines still exist, but many of them have stopped working.

But on the other hand, optimizing for the search engines is still an art that involves insight (get yourself trained, even if it is just an e-book), experience (don’t just read – ACT! implement that knowledge) and tools. Good search engine optimization software can help you a lot to get better rankings.

Black / White / Gray Promotion Techniques

I am not a big fan of so called “Black Hat” optimization techniques. Yes, you may get tremendous results in the short term, but it requires you to stay on top of the algorithms all the time (which eats away a lot of valuable time) and even worse: you can get thrown out of Google altogether if the offense is serious enough. It has happened to some major players like BMW in the past.

Back in the day keyword stuffing was the craze. Just repeat your keyword enough times in your Meta Keywords tag, and you would beat your competition. Or how about putting your keywords ON the page, but with the same colour (yes, with a “u”; I am in Canada!) as the background – so you could only see it when you highlighted the text (or in the HTML code, which is where search engine spiders were supposed to find it).

Anyway, push the envelope too much and you may find yourself falling out of the search engines primary databases – to the bottom of the pile.

Search Engine Optimization Service

But on the other hand, SEO has not changed that much at all. If you follow my philosophy for organic SEO, then you are optimizing for HUMANS – and succes in the search engines will follow automatically as a result of that.

Meaning?

Well, maybe if you are looking for a quick way into Yahoo!, or a loophole to get to the top in MSN, you may be able to rely on some “Gray Hat” techniques that may get results for as long as they last. And who knows – I have seen a lot of people say that MSN traffic converts better than Google traffic.

Optimizing For Google

But if you are looking for better placement in Google then you need some good search engine optimization software tools as well. This is not the same old search engine ranking software like TopDog (doesn’t exist anymore) or the Web Position Gold 2.0 I have collecting dust on my hard drive – although the new 4.0 version probably has a lot more to offer. Maybe I should download the 30 day trial version some day…

IBP

A few software tools that I like to use include iBusiness Promoter (IBP) for SEO Analysis and Micro Niche Finder for keyword research, domain name research, searching for related articles to use, and more. IBP I have been using for years and years now, and I keep an updated version of it to benefit from all the extra’s that German company Axandra keeps adding. Deutsche Gründlichkeit!

Definitely worth a download of the free demo version – you’ll be glad you did.

Micro Niche Power

Micro Niche Power I have learned to use a lot ever since I bought it last month. The software is very rich in feautures, easy to use and keeps getting updated for an even smoother experience. There are 5 videos made available that show you just some of the possibilities with this versatile software. Not that you have to use those options – I am happy to use it just for SEO Keyword research for the time being!

SEO Elite

A tool that I want to check out further whenever I can free up some time is SEO Elite; this software by Brad Callen has a lot of competitive intelligence SEO tools. I got a chance to test drive it when I had a ton of other proects on the go, so I never really got to experience all of it. But I recommend you check out the sales page, watch some of the videos and give it a try. After all – there is a 100% satisfaction guarantee: you can get a full refund within 8 weeks if this program does not meet your expectations.

Keep following this blog as I will discuss some of these search engine optimization software in future posts.

Tracking

If you don’t track it, you can’t improve on it. People have asked me what good free tracking tools I would recommend. Well, there are all kinds of counters out there, but many of them I find very hard to read. Or to adjust the reporting period of. Or they are just pain ugly…

What I like for a quick overview of traffic, entry pages and keywords is AWStats. You can set this Open Source software up yourself, or just opt for a hosting company that includes AWStats in its cPanel tool box. One such webhost that I recommend is BlueHost.

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