What is the best way to learn SEO?
-
I was wondering if it's worth taking an SEO Training course.
If so is it better to take a live class or Online class.
Or is better to just read all the SEO Books out there?
Or is there a good video series anyone can recommend?
What is the best way to learn SEO?
I have a good understanding of SEO but I'm not a Pro ( Yet ). Obviously SEO is always evolving so even the Pro's are constantly updating their skill set but I want to make sure my foundation is solid and complete.
Advice Please.
Thank you all.
-
Thanks everyone for your tips and advice. I appreciate the help. That's why I enjoy SEO MOZ, it's a great community to be a member of.
-
One book that helped me a lot was Search Engine Optimization Secrets by Danny Dover. That one and the art of seo were my starting point. I keep going back again to both books over and over.
-
Brad has prepared a very good list.
-
Yes.. But read the SEOmoz Beginner's guide first. Don't hesitate to read the basic chapters twice.
I have read many SEObooks. None of them have been a waste of time as long as they are reasonably current. Since there have been so many changes in Google over the past year, I would read new editions of any that are published.
Also read "In the Plex". It's not SEO but will help you understand how google works and appreciate that they always have test algos running.
-
Hi Joel,
As for these books - I've only read the 2009 edition - http://www.amazon.com/The-Art-SEO-Mastering-Optimization/dp/0596518862. There was an updated version this year - http://www.amazon.com/Art-SEO-Eric-Enge/dp/1449304214/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1339728490&sr=1-1 that I am yet to read but hope to soon.
Thanks
-
Hi Joel,
When I was talking about G+ I was talking more from a personal point of view, not your company point of view. I.e. just as a way of learning more about SEO.
Go on G+ and start following all the top SEOs - start with http://www.seomoz.org/article/recommended and http://www.linchpinseo.com/best-seos-lego-infographic (yes it's silly but it's still a great list). Each of these people will post some great resources on G+ daily.
Interact with them. Comment, share with them, mention them in shares/comments.
Also, any social profiles you have, link to all your other social profiles. I went to your SEOmoz profile thinking I would be able to get to your G+ personal profile, but alas there was no link. You'll miss out on some easy opportunities there.
Thanks
-
Do you recommend the book "Art of SEO"? or what book would you recommend?
-
Hey Brad,
What's the difference between the Art of SEO and the Art of SEO Theory in Practice?
-
I find myself spending 4 hours a day on something SEO related. Now granted most of the time its verifying what I just read to make sure it's accurate but I hear you, it's trial and error combined with constant learning and patience mixed in.
This is time well spent.
As you learn more you will be able to back off the time spent on SEO and increase the time spent improving your site.
It is better to get a good foundation on SEO now than spin your wheels for three years and then discover that you wasted your time.
-
Thanks Egol,
I find myself spending 4 hours a day on something SEO related. Now granted most of the time its verifying what I just read to make sure it's accurate but I hear you, it's trial and error combined with constant learning and patience mixed in.
-
Thanks Brad, My Facebok campaign has worked so far, so has Twitter and Linkedin, but I haven't been able to tackle Google+ effectively yet. I have a page on Google+ and I post and invite people from my other networks but no biters. Any tips on how to start a great Google+ campaign? I'm a local Realtor so my focus is Real Estate.
-
As Ben says... start by reading the Beginner's Guide to SEO.
====================
Then start working on a website, or a couple of websites.
Experiment with them by changing the title tag, adding more content to some of the pages, reoptimizing.
As you work on them, keep an SEO Log and write down the changes that you make and the dates that you make them. Watch how it influences rankings. If you do this diligently you will learn more from this than any reading.
If you are learning you should discover that your website now sucks because your knowledge has grown. That is a great thing. Rebuild the site. You will probably be amazed with the results.
====================
Install google analytics on these websites and become a student of the sources of traffic and the queries that people type in. When you improve a 200 word page to a 500 word page watch for the explosion of new long tail keywords that flood in. Watch how great content holds visitors and crap content bounces them. ( I spend a few hours a week on this - even after ten years watching the same sites.)
====================
Pick a subject that you are very familiar with and enjoy. Then create the best content on the web for that topic and post it on your site. Watch where it ranks right away (you will probably be disappointed). Check the rankings about once a week and watch what happens. You will be impressed with what happens to quality. But, be patient as this type of content rises very slowly in the SERPs -- but in 6 to 12 to 24 months you will be surprised where it ranks.
Be careful that you don't deceive yourself into thinking that your content is the best when it is merely pedestrian. Be prepared to keep it up-to-date and to improve it when someone else trumps it.
=====================
Pick a good SEO forum and visit once a day. Watch for people who come there posting titles like... "Wah! My site lost tons of traffic." Read all of those for a while and you will quickly start to see patterns. You will generally find that they have committed some type of sin, usually with links or shortcuts. Do not repeat their sins no matter how tempting. Then after each google update read the post of the people who are cryin' and you will soon learn that google is smacking down a different type of shortcut and that google rarely smacks down quality that is difficult to produce.
While you are on these forums never listen closely to all of the advice, because lots of the advice in SEO forums is really bad advice - even when it comes from gurus and oracles. Nobody understands google perfectly and most advice given is shooting from the hip with fragmentary data - especially if the advisor has not spend a lot of time on your website and studied your analytics carefully over time.
Spend a couple hours a week poking into busy forums. You will learn a lot, find strong allies and trusted people who will be worth hiring for jobs where you lack expertise.
=====================
After you think you have learn an awful lot, go back and reread the Beginner's Guide to SEO with a great desire to improve. You will probably discover again that you website sucks. This is a good thing. Don't hesitate to rebuild properly because you will most likely receive a great reward.
-
Thumbs up for Ben. I agree wholeheartedly.
These forums are a fantastic place to learn SEO, I think I've learnt the most from interacting on here. Keep asking questions, respond to others and learn, learn, learn.
As for books, I would start with these if you haven't already:
- http://www.amazon.com/Search-Engine-Optimization-SEO-Secrets/dp/0470554185/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1339725028&sr=8-7
- http://www.amazon.com/The-Art-SEO-Eric-Enge/dp/1449304214/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1339725028&sr=8-11
Subscribe to all the best blogs/sites out there and read constantly. Some of my favourites include:
- http://www.seomoz.org/blog
- http://www.distilled.net/blog/
- http://www.rosshudgens.com/
- http://searchengineland.com/
- http://mashable.com/follow/topics/SEO/
- http://www.seerinteractive.com/blog
Also, if you don't already, get active on G+. Like Ben said, the best SEOs respond to queries, and I find that G+ is the best place to interact with the higher level SEOs.
Thanks,
Brad
-
Thanks Ben, I've read a bunch of books, blogs and forums but I feel there are still gaps in my SEO for my site. Trying to figure the best way to fill those gaps. I'm on page one for almost all my main keywords but I feel like there is something missing.
-
I'd been dabbling in SEO since 2007 when I finally buckled down about 2 years and jumped in head first. The biggest influence on me was the Beginner's Guide To SEO that SEOmoz just updated. Then I went through every White Board Friday and Pro Webinar I could.
Followed key people on Twitter and asked some of the dumbest questions. SEO's (at least good ones) are so incredible helpful and willing to help you out. I can remember getting my first big client and I called just to get more acquainted with the Pro Tools here. Actually got to talk to Cyrus, before I knew who he was.
So basically: read, follow, and ask. With every change in the SEOsphere you become that much more of an expert.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
SEO Best Practices regarding Robots.txt disallow
I cannot find hard and fast direction about the following issue: It looks like the Robots.txt file on my server has been set up to disallow "account" and "search" pages within my site, so I am receiving warnings from the Google Search console that URLs are being blocked by Robots.txt. (Disallow: /Account/ and Disallow: /?search=). Do you recommend unblocking these URLs? I'm getting a warning that over 18,000 Urls are blocked by robots.txt. ("Sitemap contains urls which are blocked by robots.txt"). Seems that I wouldn't want that many urls blocked. ? Thank you!!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | jamiegriz0 -
What is the best way to add semantic linked data to WordPress?
As a recent Moz subscriber, I'm trying to up my game in terms of inbound marketing. One of the most pressing tasks is to add json-ld across all of my WordPress sites. What is the best way to do this? Should I use the technique set out here: https://moz.com/blog/using-google-tag-manager-to-dynamically-generate-schema-org-json-ld-tags Or should I use one of these plugins? https://en-gb.wordpress.org/plugins/schema/ https://en-gb.wordpress.org/plugins/wp-structuring-markup/ I want to get this right so any guidance would be gratefully received.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | treb0r0 -
Dealing with negative SEO
Interested to know people strategies for detecting and mitigating negative SEO. Previously I've used link monitoring tool and kept an eye on all new back links coming in to any page on the site. I have then manually assessed each one again using some tools and actually visiting the website. However, this always leaves me with one dilemma. Regardless of my assessment how do search engines see that link? I run three lists a white list, grey list and blacklist. White list - very relevant and have a lot of authority. I.e. leading industry blogs and forums. Grey list - out of topic/industry, directories Blacklist - sites de-indexed by Google, illegal content or absolute spam (i.e. one page filled with hundreds of links to different domains) Do you have any thoughts? How do you assess if link is bad?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoman100 -
Whats the best way to set up a directory listing website
Hello all, I am building a website that lists homeschool events and field trips across various states (locker-time.com) and I have a few questions on setting it up correctly. Both the events and field trips are searchable by distance. For clarification, events are associated with a specific date and time and field trips are not. I currently have a link that says homeschool events and you enter your zip to find things close by. Is it better to create a separate page for each state I am targeting instead? So the link would be homeschool events and then a sub-link that says homeschool events in GA and the GA page brings up all the events in GA, still searchable by zip. Or does it matter? I was thinking if its a separate page, I could put keyword rich copy on top, but then clicking on the menu and choosing the appropriate sub-menu is an additional step for users on the site and as the number of states increase, that sub-menu could get pretty big. The search results pages lists the post title of any events or field trips found and the links go to a page on my website with more information, such as the location, details on the event / field trip and a link to their website. I am wondering for SEO purposes, is this the right way to do it? Or I could set up the results page to show an excerpt and some listing info and then link directly to their website. Does it matter? I was thinking a page on my own website since then I could add images (but that might end up sucking up all my hosting space). As I am adding these listings to my website, I simply copied/pasted the details on the event. Now that I'm thinking about it, original content is best, so should I stop doing that and rewrite the description in my own words? Since the events are date specific events and when they pass, they are no longer on the site, does it matter as much for the events? The field trips do not have dates associated with them, so I can probably work on creating my own descriptions for those. Just not sure if I should bother with events that are more short term. Thanks in advance for ANY advice or suggestions. I'm so looking forward to getting this all set up correctly! I find working on this SEO stuff such fun! Jeanette
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | fatcreat0 -
Best way to permanently remove URLs from the Google index?
We have several subdomains we use for testing applications. Even if we block with robots.txt, these subdomains still appear to get indexed (though they show as blocked by robots.txt. I've claimed these subdomains and requested permanent removal, but it appears that after a certain time period (6 months)? Google will re-index (and mark them as blocked by robots.txt). What is the best way to permanently remove these from the index? We can't use login to block because our clients want to be able to view these applications without needing to login. What is the next best solution?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | nicole.healthline0 -
SEO Features of Different Shopping Cart, Need Help on Selecting BEST Cart
I want to move my existing online store to a new Multilanguage Shopping Cart. After reading Andrew Bleakley's review, I have to make a dissisions between the following shopping cart. New to SEO, I will like to have your impressions on there SEO Features and HELP me select the BEST SEO frendly shopping cart. corecommerce: Search Engine Friendly
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BigBlaze205
• Entire store is search engine optimized
• Dynamically generates static html pages with clean URL's (no numbers and special characters inside the URL's) for products, categories and custom content pages (ie about us, etc.)
• Auto Generated Meta Tags for your store to create web site page rankings that matter!
• Built in Canonical URL's
• Header tags usage for your product names
• Auto-build of the Google XML Sitemap
• Meta tags for all products, categories and content pages
• Add your own custom meta tags from your store
• You determine the page titles
• You can add custom content for the category pages
• Use of alt and title tags for images
• Use of bread crumb trails
• Customer SEO page slugs (naming) for products and categories americommerce: Have a look at there page, the list is to long. http://www.americommerce.com/ecommerce-seo.html ------------------------------ asho Web Optimisation - SEO
Fully Search Engine Optimised (SEO) structure
Optimised and updated by industry leading SEO experts
Source code optimised for search engines
Page based META management. Titles, descriptions and keywords
Link popularity program between Ashop Commerce customers
Always up to date with new search engine algorithms
Spider friendly URLs
301 Redirect and 302 Redirect support for any page
Free SEO tips & tools
Auto HTML and CSS page generation
Google, Yahoo and Bing verification meta inclusion
Inbuilt automatic XML site map generation (Google, Yahoo, Bing)
Correct use of robots.txt file
Correct use of NOFOLLOW attribute
Auto set up with correct hierarchy for H tags
Auto creation of alt text on menu text links and images
Tableless design structure Pinnaclecart Cutting-edge search engine optimization
Flat URL generation (www.yoursite.com/product/product-name.htm)
Ability to create your own URL structure (www.yoursite.com/create-your-own-url.html)
Manage all URL's at the category, product and page level.
If you're moving from a different application, you can change the URL's to match the old URL's.
Meta keyword, title and description for each product page
Meta keyword, title and description for each category page
Meta keyword and description for home page and all pages created via the control panel
Upload / create robot.txt file
Ability to generate meta tags based on product descriptions
Ability to modify HTML or CSS via browser
Automatically generated site map
Generates XML site map for Google Base
Valid WC3 template design
Image ALT tags
Design generates very lightweight, 100% HTML page without CSS or PHP coding
Creates "breadcrumb" navigation
Search-engine-friendly architecture
Ability to upload customized HTML pages to assist in How would you rate those carts structure in a SEO point of view? My existing store, http://www.filtrationmontreal.com/ (OsCommerce) need SEO improvement and moving it to a SEO Frendly Shopping Cart is the best thing I can do to increase sales and conversions. Thank you for your support, help and precious time. BigBlaze0