[BobMcDaniel]

I've noticed that a lot of people on this forum seem to mostly focus on a site's pagerank and the number of links they have built or would like to build to their site. - That's not a winning approach nor is this a solid strategy for the long term success in attaining great organic search visibility in Google.

No more confusion - Let's get some clarity here!

What not to do: Do not build 1000s of low quality links to your site from spam-filled general directories. Do not engage in low-quality guest posting, with keyword-rich anchor text to your site. - You will get Penguin-ed by Google! Do not post crappy shallow articles on your site! - You will get Pandalized by Google! Also, do not waste your time on free hosts!


The Basics: Let me share a few proven ways to get your contracting site to rank well in the organic search results in Google. - First and foremost, have something of value (to your visitors) to say on your own site beyond the typical we are the best blah blah blah. - Instead, explain why are you the best, what makes your company different, etc. Have a blog where you regularly share your thoughts and ideas relevant to your clients. - These blog posts should address the common problems and headaches your potential clients face. Explain the problem, offer the solution, be a hero to your potential clients. Make sure you have a contact form - All of the above points are just the basics, but you would be surprised how many people get these wrong!

Link building: You should focus on relevance - Building a brand - Avoiding over-optimization.

Here is how; first get your basics for local search established: get your company listed in your typical relevant local directories such yellow pages and other local directories that give you citations, do not worry about the fact that they give you nofollow links as this is only for local search. Also get a Google+ Business listing, Yelp.com listing, AngiesList.com, and kudzu.com listing. Get your established clients to review each of those listings - You will need at least one positive review in each of these to help you with the local search visibility.

Organic Search Visibility: Please note that this step only makes sense if you actually have unique/original content on your site, whether it's your site pages or blog posts. - The content needs to be original, relevant to your clients, and it must be well written, high quality, useful info. - Great posts with useful info on your blog will actually help you earn natural links overtime - this is an important concept to grasp for long term success!

Now, if you already have some great content on your site, it's time to focus on improving relevance, trust, and authority of your site. You can do this by getting relevant links pointing to your site from the relevant industry hubs where you can get your company listed, as well as get some high-quality, relevant dofollow links.

Despite, what many know-it-all folks may tell you about web directories and their usefulness or lack thereof, IMHO, the true quality and topical relevance will get you far! Here is a list of my personal favorite (dofollow) Home Improvement Directories, some of these may have been mentioned before: www.HomeImprovementDir.org - (PR6 - 49.95 one-time editorial review) www.AllConstructionDirectory.com - (PR6 - 49.95 one-time editorial review) www.FindLocalDirectory.com - (PR5 - 24.95 one-time editorial review) www.AllGreenProducts.org - (PR4 - 34.95 one-time editorial review) www.HomeImprovementWeb.com - (PR3 - 19.95 one-time editorial review) www.GreatPossibilities.com - (PR3 - Offers free and paid inclusion, requires registration and confirmation to add a listing - Must be patient!) www.RemodelingDir.com - (Newer site, with no PR yet, but already ranks really well - 24.95) www.GreenBuilding.co - (Newer site, No PR yet, ranks really well, 100% hand-coded, which makes it rather unique. - Need to Email their Team) I've had much success in improving organic search visibility of my sites with the above construction directories, thanks to their topical relevance. :thumbup: I do recommend that you use your company name in the title so that your listing is deemed as natural. You can always include your important keyphrases and service area as part of the description. Please note, I have not listed any directories that charge a recurring fee such as BuilderSpace.com in the above list Furthermore, any other home improvement directories that no longer seem to rank well on their own merit, or give you nofollow links did not make the list.

When you go ahead and submit your site to the above directories, make sure that you use your company's name in the title and provide a unique description with each submission. - The reason why you want to use your company's name as opposed your money terms is because you want to boost relevance and brand of your site. If you have the right kind of content and lots of relevance, your site and its pages well start ranking well eventually. Give it 3 to 6 months to see the full effect of your submissions, although as the links age, your site will become more and more authoritative. Continue posting high quality articles on your site even as you as start building links to your small business website.

Need ideas for your articles/blog posts? How about sharing challenges you encounter on a particular job and how you solve those challenges. Be sure to include pictures and tell your story in such a way that shows your future customers that you have what it takes to solve their problems! (this is where you insert the link to your contact form)

Remember it's all about relevance and brand building, and great content really is your best friend!

 

[tigerwash]

Great info for the beginners on here! SEO is not that complicated but can be difficult for those unfamiliar with the process

 

[BobMcDaniel]

Great info for the beginners on here! SEO is not that complicated but can be difficult for those unfamiliar with the process

Spot on, it's not difficult if you know what you are doing, but most contractors who are good at what they do, may be easily confused especially with all the misinformation out there.

One thing I always see play out without a fail, is a newbie starting to chase the number of links, while also paying excessive undue attention to domain authority and PR. - Newbies also often chase the keyword rich text links they find in all the wrong places... Next thing you know their website trips a filter and gets dropped from Google search results. - It's often at this point that they start asking questions such as what is topical relevance? What does natural link profile look like? Why does shallow content hurts their site in Google? It goes without saying that most visitors will think you are hack if you have shallow content on your site, or if they find a crappy article on the likes of Ezine articles pointing to your site.

Anyhow, SEO is easy if you know what you are doing, but chances are that while some guys on this forum may be savvy through trial and error, most guys on here are probably dazed and confused by all the SEO gurus out there. :no:

So, be sure to build out your site with solid content, no spelling errors, no typos, no shallowness in your writing. Make sure your content stands out - that's how you show people and search engines alike that your content represents who you are and the quality of workmanship your clients can expect from you.

Once you get that site built out nicely, and get a few local citations in the likes of yellow pages, at that point you can go ahead and start building some relevance by getting your company listed in some of the home improvement construction industry hubs listed in the original thread.

Just to help all the painting contractors out, I am going to go ahead and list some examples of the specific categories where you want to get your company listed on those home improvement directories:

http://www.homeimprovementdir.org/contractors/painting-contractors/

http://www.allconstructiondirectory.com/contractors/painting-contractors/

Well, you get the idea, and if the category does not exist yet, most quality home improvement directories will create one for you. Just remember to use your actual company name rather than the Best Painter in Chicago - you can always put location as part of description - Remember guys, this is all bout associating your business with the trusted home improvement hubs, and all you really want here is to gain that topical authority/relevance for your website, as well as obtain some quality branding signals that come with your website being listed. Be bold and invest in the long term success of your business! - Give this some time to work, and keep on blogging!

 

[jason123]

The seo world seems so limitless, I find it hard to follow through with it sometimes.

 

[BobMcDaniel]

The seo world seems so limitless, I find it hard to follow through with it sometimes.

Sure thing, on its face, doing SEO for a small business website and keeping up with all the latest changes in SEO may seem like a daunting task, but if you stick to the core principles of improving your site's online visibility, you will surely find that it's actually doable.

For instance, there was a Google Panda update just last week, which actually helps smaller websites with quality content rank better. - But, you do not need to follow all the latest SEO updates and buzz per say, as long as you keep your content top notch and constantly keep improving its usefulness, quality, and depth and readability.

As far as your site authority and relevance are concerned, read the original post in this thread, with the easy to follow guidelines, and your small business website will surely do alright! Meaning that you will be getting exposure to your target audience, with qualified leads coming in.

Remember it's all about branding, quality content, and natural, brand-building links from relevant hubs in your industry i.e Home Improvement.

 

[BobMcDaniel]

Latest update: Google's search quality engineer Gary Illyes has just announced that Google's next generation Penguin update may be rolled out as early as next week. - This may be an exciting news for those whose sites have been penalized by one of the previous iterations of Penguin.

If you have been affected by the last refresh of Google's Penguin update that has happened just over a year ago affecting many thousands of websites due to low quality, spammy links, often with exact anchors targeting exact money keywords. - If your site has been affected, hopefully by now you've identified all the low quality links that may have hurt your site and uploaded them onto Google's Link Disavow tool.

Interestingly, but not surprisingly, those who have disavowed their links in the last two weeks will likely not get the credit for any of the disavowed links during the upcoming Penguin refresh, but Google says that going forward Penguin refreshes will now be more frequent, similar to Panda refreshes that now happen on a monthly basis.

If you are still in the process of disavowing the bad links pointing to your site, keep in mind that it's not enough to simply disavow all the old links pointing to your site, you need to separate the good ones from the ones that are actually toxic, as well as gain new quality links from trusted home improvement hubs pointing to your site. I've outlined many quality home improvement directories in the beginning of this thread. - Please do not confuse those with the low quality general directories that have numerous adult and gambling sites listed within their pages. Remember guys, you need topical relevance, and trusted home improvement hubs may be just what the Dr. ordered to get you started on the right track.

 

[6126]

Great post. I actually printed it. Thanks for sharing :thumbsup:

 

[Zman828]

Great information. Thank you for sharing

 

[/aa/]

Really helpful posts. SEO can get so complicated by itself and with constant changes and updates coming from google, it's even harder to keep up with the best methods out there. Thanks for the refresher!

 

[BobMcDaniel]

Quick Update to Keep you on Top of Local Search!

I've noticed that a lot of people on this forum seem to mostly focus on a site's pagerank and the number of links they have built or would like to build to their site. - That's not a winning approach nor is this a solid strategy for the long term success in attaining great organic search visibility in Google.

No more confusion - Let's get some clarity here!

What not to do: Do not build 1000s of low quality links to your site from spam-filled general directories. Do not engage in low-quality guest posting, with keyword-rich anchor text to your site. - You will get Penguin-ed by Google! Do not post crappy shallow articles on your site! - You will get Pandalized by Google! Also, do not waste your time on free hosts!


The Basics: Let me share a few proven ways to get your contracting site to rank well in the organic search results in Google. - First and foremost, have something of value (to your visitors) to say on your own site beyond the typical we are the best blah blah blah. - Instead, explain why are you the best, what makes your company different, etc. Have a blog where you regularly share your thoughts and ideas relevant to your clients. - These blog posts should address the common problems and headaches your potential clients face. Explain the problem, offer the solution, be a hero to your potential clients. Make sure you have a contact form - All of the above points are just the basics, but you would be surprised how many people get these wrong!

Link building: You should focus on relevance - Building a brand - Avoiding over-optimization.

Here is how; first get your basics for local search established: get your company listed in your typical relevant local directories such yellow pages and other local directories that give you citations, do not worry about the fact that they give you nofollow links as this is only for local search. Also get a Google+ Business listing, Yelp.com listing, AngiesList.com, and kudzu.com listing. Get your established clients to review each of those listings - You will need at least one positive review in each of these to help you with the local search visibility.

Organic Search Visibility: Please note that this step only makes sense if you actually have unique/original content on your site, whether it's your site pages or blog posts. - The content needs to be original, relevant to your clients, and it must be well written, high quality, useful info. - Great posts with useful info on your blog will actually help you earn natural links overtime - this is an important concept to grasp for long term success!

Now, if you already have some great content on your site, it's time to focus on improving relevance, trust, and authority of your site. You can do this by getting relevant links pointing to your site from the relevant industry hubs where you can get your company listed, as well as get some high-quality, relevant dofollow links.

Despite, what many know-it-all folks may tell you about web directories and their usefulness or lack thereof, IMHO, the true quality and topical relevance will get you far! Here is a list of my personal favorite (dofollow) Home Improvement Directories, some of these may have been mentioned before: www.HomeImprovementDir.org - (PR6 - 49.95 one-time editorial review) www.AllConstructionDirectory.com - (PR6 - 49.95 one-time editorial review) www.FindLocalDirectory.com - (PR5 - 24.95 one-time editorial review) www.AllGreenProducts.org - (PR4 - 34.95 one-time editorial review) www.HomeImprovementWeb.com - (PR3 - 19.95 one-time editorial review) www.GreatPossibilities.com - (PR3 - Offers free and paid inclusion, requires registration and confirmation to add a listing - Must be patient!) www.RemodelingDir.com - (Newer site, with no PR yet, but already ranks really well - 24.95) www.GreenBuilding.co - (Newer site, No PR yet, ranks really well, 100% hand-coded, which makes it rather unique. - Need to Email their Team) I've had much success in improving organic search visibility of my sites with the above construction directories, thanks to their topical relevance. :thumbup: I do recommend that you use your company name in the title so that your listing is deemed as natural. You can always include your important keyphrases and service area as part of the description. Please note, I have not listed any directories that charge a recurring fee such as BuilderSpace.com in the above list Furthermore, any other home improvement directories that no longer seem to rank well on their own merit, or give you nofollow links did not make the list.

When you go ahead and submit your site to the above directories, make sure that you use your company's name in the title and provide a unique description with each submission. - The reason why you want to use your company's name as opposed your money terms is because you want to boost relevance and brand of your site. If you have the right kind of content and lots of relevance, your site and its pages well start ranking well eventually. Give it 3 to 6 months to see the full effect of your submissions, although as the links age, your site will become more and more authoritative. Continue posting high quality articles on your site even as you as start building links to your small business website.

Need ideas for your articles/blog posts? How about sharing challenges you encounter on a particular job and how you solve those challenges. Be sure to include pictures and tell your story in such a way that shows your future customers that you have what it takes to solve their problems! (this is where you insert the link to your contact form)

Remember it's all about relevance and brand building, and great content really is your best friend!

Quick update, it looks like GreatPossibilities no longer offers free listings, and their silver listing is $99 per year, which is pretty much double the cost of a professional company listing at the All Construction Directory that does not have any renewal fees.

# 2, very important, I've just discovered a great service to get some quality local citations from places like CitySearch, HomeStead and others absolutely free. Here is how: Go to www.ExpressUpdate.com and submit your company's info. - They are a local listing aggregator and it may take up to two months for your company to get listed in all of their directories, but it's def. worth the wait, plus it's free! Compare that to similar services like Yext which costs about $500 per year, or even MOZ Local $99 per year.

Make sure you also get your company listed in these super important do follow hubs that will help you with both organic and local search visibility and trust: AllConstructionDirectory.com, HomeImprovementDir.org, FindLocalDirectory.com, RemodelingDir.com, GreenBuilding.co, HomeImprovementWeb.com and here is another one I've just discovered: HomeBlue.com $49 to get listed.

Cheers and Happy upcoming Thanks Giving to all the Hardworking guys and gals on this forum!

 

[airclay]

:thumbup: This answered tons of questions for me. Thanks a ton!

 

[jason123]

As the years go by so do the blog post.. Any who,,,

Muralform is my third website and Im pretty happy with my blog I have about 4 blog posts a month on relevant topics towards murals and such. I have made a goal to write not for search terms but an actual decent blog so if one were to read it they would get cool information on murals and such as opposed to crammed spam.

http://muralform.com/blog/

 

[1st Coast Painting]

Great Information

Great information. As Painting contractors we have a lot on our plates. Finding time to allocate to your companies website is challenging at times, but with out a great online presence your business will suffer. I have found that making an outline and a to do list has allowed me to prioritize what needs to be done. It is easy to over think the whole process of your website between design, text, marketing, and optimization. Take one project at a time, do your research, and put out quality information and relevant locations.

 

[MichaelHenry]

Directory listings are the low-hanging fruit here. I don't know that a local business has much to gain from a blog. I would surprised to see a local painting business get a lead from a blog post, unless you're incorporating it with drip email after someone submits a contact form or something.

 

[lubbocktxpainters]

Does this info still apply today?

 

[AkronPainters]

Still Apply

Pretty much. Some of the links mentioned are outdated, but the SEO portion about quality links and content still applies today. I'm constantly trying to build my painting company website rank and even started a new deck building and fence building company. Organic ranking will improve your business a lot if you're in a good market.

 

[PeterRuchti]

Exactly what AkronPainters said. It does matter and your domain authority is very important. It isn't everything, but you need high quality (and relevant) backlinks.

My recommendation is to get backlinks (by either blogging or by being listed as a partnering company) on other local websites (like a home builder, remodeling company, etc).