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SEO essentials for startups in under 10 minutes

Tuesday, June 26, 2012 at 6:00 AM

Webmaster Level: Beginner to Intermediate

Wondering how to be search-friendly but lacking time for SEO research? We’d like to help! Meta keywords tag? Google Search ignores it. Meta description? Good to include.
If you:
  • Work on a company website that’s under 50ish pages.
  • Hope to rank well for your company name and a handful of related terms (not lots of terms like a news agency or e-commerce site).
  • Want to be smart about search engines and attracting searchers, but haven’t kept up with the latest search news.
Then perhaps set aside ten minutes for this video (or just the slides) and gain SEO peace of mind.


Everything I’d tell a startup if I had ten minutes as their SEO consultant.

More tips at developers.google.com/startups. Best of luck!

The comments you read here belong only to the person who posted them. We do, however, reserve the right to remove off-topic comments.

36 comments:

Ifinder said...

Very very helpful and so simple. Unwinding myths. Thank you so much.

Jean-Michel de Sousa said...

Hello Maile Ohye,

It’s a great video and I m glad you still recommend to use descriptive anchor texts. It’s quick and efficient! Well done.

I would just add something about the examples you took, it’s not that common to see a startup with 50 pages selling running shoes ;)

A better example could have been on data back-up because it’s high competitive and mixed of content type. Often you just start a new site and the topic is just huge on search making it overall very difficult to come out.

Jean-Michel

Jayprakash said...

Fantastic ! It was an eye opening experience. Very very good for website owners like me.

Harish Nelipot said...

This is one of the greatest videos about SEO. Shall I share my suggestions? Most Website designers are after fancy graphics covering the top of the website with slide shows. And customers also like this. But once they are not getting enough visitors they blame the website service providing companies. Then gaining natural links require great content to be posted at regular intervals. But most people look for results too quickly. This leads lot of spamming techniques to be adapted for SEO. The best way is to do websites in a staright forward way. Isnt it.

Uday Kiran said...

You made SEO as simple as that.., informative one..,

Krishna Salvi said...

Very Good Post, Thanks!!

kumar said...

Great Informative video .

Cath Hodgson said...

thanks, just shared on Twitter

Heiko Mamerow said...

Great video - Thank You!

I'll make this as a "must watch" for my clients. :-)

Btw: It would be nice, if you can make the video also in other languages (for me: german). Otherwise, can i translate the slides for me - is this ok?


Greatings from Berlin/Germany
Heiko

Matt Staton said...

Great info and helped me change 302's to 301's on www.NotifyMeNow.com

Thanks again Google!

Gustavo Macedo said...

Unfortunate title...

David Limon said...

Great SEO suggestions for beginners!
Something that should be included as a beginning step since Google has placed emphasis on duplicate content is the use of canonical tags or properly directing traffic using your robots.txt and .htaccess files.

David Limon

Christina Osburn said...

Wow - That just opened up my eyes! Thank you for the great info!!

Scollon Taylor said...

thanks

Ahmad Khoirul Azmi said...

Thanks! a 10 minute video which is very easy to follow, plus great tips to apply for my startups :)

Hamza Ghanchi said...

Those were really good tips and video shows adequate information regarding improving online presence with various tips.

xxJojas84 said...

Thanks! Really helpful, and I learned a LOT about SEO here. Thanks!

Hristina said...

Hi,

Do you plan to launch a course, something like the search course which is about to start?

There are questions that I (and probably many other people) would like to ask, information coming from 3rd parties being sometimes confusing (e.g. re keywords, url, etc.)

Thx in advance
Hristina

Nabeel said...

Thanx for sharing these basic essential seo tips. I will look for more links on your website.

MyInvitations said...

Don't listen to them.

We've spent years following the guidelines, listening to videos, not paying for links etc, keeping it up to date and relevant.

To start with all is good, your site may do well, you start to rely on the income generated by the traffic Google sends you. Your kids and family start to rely on this as well.

Then, one day, someone in Google decides to destroy everything OVERNIGHT, and without warning.

You go from 000's of clicks to 1 or 2.

You spend months trying to work out why, and all the time your competitors, who almost certainly pay for their links, keep taking your customers.

You use Webmaster Help Forum, who are clueless.

You re-submit, and are told you are not being punished!!!

You write to Google, and they ignore you again and again and again and again, and again.

To succeed....
I know three webmasters, all pay for links and other Shady schemes and all have websites that now appear reliably at the top of Google. YOU DECIDE.

Since the changes Google made around March/April, my website, business, and income have died.

One day you will come to rely on your website, and the income it generates, the next day, Google may decide, on a whim, to ruin your business, and all those that rely on it, and when you ask them why...

THEY WILL IGNORE YOU!

jamel bastian said...

Αυτό μπορεί να είναι πολύ χρήσιμη για μένα .....
Ευχαριστίες για τη διανομή συμβουλές για SEO .....

Ramzi Ebaz said...

I really want to be able to master seo
thanks for the video tutorial, I will learn to practice the techniques taught seo
success for google
regards

Ramzi

Unknown said...

@Myinvitations That's true, i had this a couple of years ago and never recovered. Nobody knows the cause, even Google. It's a lottery. If you have a good ranking for a keyword , hope for the best prepare for the worst. Someday your ranking will vanish without a reason.

Matt Sells said...

Great tips for beginners!

53north said...

@MyInvitations
A pleasant site, with evidence of time spent getting the css correct in all browsers & to still be reasonably good in IE6; No vertical Fb tabs hiding menu links etc..
Original Images, with alt text, sizing, and a paragraph for each pic;
7000 letter count minimum for articles;
Minimal advertising impact;
Simple menu not reliant on js;
Nofollows on links to your own sites or anything that maybe seen as reciprocal or paid...

Natalia Tsymbalenko said...

Great video.
But I was having a hard time to read the slides.
I think it's because I had a sound input plus the slide was moving.
I would rather see them static

Smart News Network said...

Guess what? Google just dropped to the #2 position in Alexa. Google has been number 1 for years. Now Facebook is #1 in Alexa today! Google is making too many changes that is affecting their traffic and mine and others as well. This is a historic day folks. Google is hurting our economy, invention, innovation, and creativity. By enacting all these algorithm changes, it hurting webmasters who do not spam and who are creating a great service to the world. Their voices are not being heard, seen and overall will hurt everyone, even big business. Google must be stopped!

Zoekmachine Optimalisatie said...

Maile :) We @ SEO Wiz are a great fan of your presentations! When will you do one on Meta Keywords, as I have heard Google is bringing them back?

Kattey Spares said...

Very Nice Article to make the SEO as simple that i can't Think in this way...

Thanks for sharing..:-)

Tushar Verma said...

Hello,

This video is a very very useful. Especially for a guy like me who is interested to learn more

Thanks for the same and regards

Darryl Tay said...

“Consider your customers, also your investors… or even the press.” Indeed, Maile! From utility, navigation, and content – aiming for simplicity and functionality is the most efficient strategy that should be included in any site strategy. Don’t try and over decorate, as it doesn’t invite customers to explore your website further, instead, it drives them away.

- Darryl Tay

Suzy Bureau said...

This was a great, simple, informative video. When you're a startup, it's difficult to keep up with everything, but a quick ten-minute video of the fundamentals is what people need!

Suzy Bureau said...

This was a great video! When you work at a startup, it's incredibly difficult to keep up with everything. Obviously, ranking for relevant terms is at the top of the list. This is a great, informative, concise description of the best tips. Thanks!

jenefer lopez said...

please answer my ne question,
Is it possible if i want hide som part(content) of my page to searh engine ?
i.e If i want google not view our page we use nofollow right.

But i want make available my page for google but some of its content not. is it possible?
i hope you understand what i wana ask.

Vale Riccione said...

If I choose in google webmaster the preference without www. and then i validate by html file, my site will have some penalty for content in organic searches?
The results will be doubled?

Marlena Torres said...

Very nicely written post it contains useful information for me.Now you make it easy for me to understand and implement the concept. Thank you for the post.