You see, the huge companies may have the financial resources and the famous people in the industry. So, how are you supposed to compete with these Goliaths? What can you do to, at least, get a piece of their fame? Is it even doable in the first place?

Focus on Their Weakness

If you focus on their strengths, you will just wallow in despair. No, don’t look at those. Instead, find out where they are lacking. Always go for their weaknesses because everyone has, at least, one.

Fill in the gaps.

• First, you need to do a content audit. List all the keywords that you want to rank for and the keywords you haven’t.
• Then, compare your data with your competitors. This will give you an idea on what keywords you and your competitor are ranking for. Check if the industry players are not ranking for these terms. If not, then, take it as an opportunity to gain an advantage.
• For instance, you chose the education industry and rank for “learn Russian.” If you wish to compete with companies such as Duolingo and Rosetta Stone. Then, you will have an idea to rank for words like “private Russian tutor” and “One-on-one Russian classes”. Of course, these terms are not what the key industry player is aiming for.

Create more content to fill the gaps.

• Next, you should also look at the content formats that are not being used by these companies. If you see more text-based tutorials, then, make a video tutorial. If you notice that everyone is doing a video tutorial, maybe creating worksheets and PDF files to clearly illustrate the diagrams and charts.
• Now that you know what kind of content format to use, you can take advantage and make more of what is currently lacking. If you think there are NO advanced language lessons, go ahead and do that. Stop competing in the basic level, for sure, most people have shared basic phrases they know.

Show your strength.

• Focus on the things you can control. Improvements do not need to be technical. First, you start by proofreading your content. Polish and assure only excellent quality. You really don’t need to invest money on that. For content formating, it just needs time and patience.
• Enhance how content is displayed: change the font type, font type, colors, etc. Make it look professional. Most of the time, people rely on the standard template. No, be particular on the little details to up your performance.
• Aside from that, formulate unique and catchy meta description to encourage people to click your page.

Use other methods.

• There are things you can use to your advantage. For example, social media. Promote your website or posts here. Add relevant #hashtags when posting.
• Look at how the larger brands do their advertising campaigns. In reality, even huge companies utilize multiple platforms to promote. They don’t stick to one so you better do the same as well!

If you don’t know where to start, begin by doing these 5 Tips in Making Your Weekly SEO Strategy Simpler.

Lately, I have been explaining about internal links and it has been evident in blog posts such as Internal Links and Why it Truly Matters and The Link Between Internal Links and SEO.

Now, I will talk about one particular aspect, which is the nofollow attribute. Search engines — Google included —  introduced this feature knowing that some links are:

• Uncertain: You aren’t sure if the links are to be trusted or not.
• Uncontrollable: There are things beyond your line of command. (For instance, the comments publish on the comments section.)

To address this issue, search engines formulated a way link to other websites without necessarily vouching for them. Having said that, you  ‘nofollow’ a link is when you want to tell the search engines that this certain link does not have my ‘vote of confidence’. Moreover, you are merely linking the website for reference.

The question now, should you nofollow an internal link?

In some instances, you should toggle the nofollow option. Here are some example scenarios:

• First, the link is not accessed by many. For example, it is a page that needs login credentials. So, a nofollow is needed here.
• Second, it is not that important. For instance, you are merely linking a page that contains all your sources and references. This page is not beneficial to the public; they won’t learn anything from this. Thus, you can simply nofollow this link.

Lastly, for internal links, not using the nofollow feature is totally okay. To be honest, it really would not change anything if you choose to nofollow a link or not. At the end of the day, when you nofollow an internal link, it’s really a matter of personal choice.

Nofollow Links Matter.

Still, it doesn’t discount the fact that nofollow links are important. When you do not vouch for a link, then you should be using nofollow. Why is this? So, Google cannot give your website penalties for linking to a website that is suspicious or shady. You are confirming to Google that you can assure its quality. Whether it is a low-quality website or not, it is already out of your hands. Also, Google would not penalize you for having too many — or too little — nofollow links. There is no such thing!

Nowadays, huge websites usually add a nofollow rule on all their external links. Just to be sure. This mean that these large companies have no intention of giving value to the links outside their domain.

Whether you choose to a nofollow link or not, it will still be useful. Users can still see the clickable link and they can opt to visit the link if they wish to. You are just simply spreading awareness that you aren’t sure about this link. In the end, with or without a link, mentioning a brand or a website really helps. Your mentioning can boost brand awareness.

When you decide to link out, the rules are not definite here. If you want to know some guidelines to follow, then read my article on: When Do You “Nofollow” Links?

SOURCE: (1), (2)

Yes, internal links are essential in SEO… AND for user experience! If one website provide internal links, the browsing experience will improve and jumping from one page to another would seem seamless. So, you better add any links another related within your website.  This will give users more reasons to stay and browse! Not only that, internal links will also help search engines understand your website better.

Internal links are like connected jigsaw puzzle pieces.

What are internal links?

For starters, a website can have 2 links: external or internal. The external links are those links that are redirecting to another website. Meanwhile, internal links are links that refer to a page within a website. For instance, learn about the Tips in Avoiding Anchor Text Over Optimization.

Basically, for intenral links, it can either be:

• pointing a user to a section of the same web page, or
• redirecting a user to another page within the same domain name. For instance, this: 4 Best Practices to Use when Adding Anchor Texts.

In HTML, the link is added within the <a href> tag like the example below:

<a href="https://www.phoenixsearchengineoptimization.com/understanding-the-connection-between-anchor-text-and-seo/">Insert Relevant Anchor Text Here</a>

Thus, you can certainly say that internal links help in:

• improving website navigation
• connecting related pages together
• helping search engines identify a website’s important pages
• extending the reach of your website’s popular pages

Why does internal linking matter?

As I have discussed, a good internal linking system offer numerous benefits for a website. It helps both its users and search engines. For some basic tips, the homepage of a website should be able to help users to move around the important pages of the website. Each page should be connected to another until it forms a huge web of connected pages. Hence, the name website is born!

On the other hand, internal links help search engines too. With internal links, website crawlers can scan a website more smoothly and efficiently. More on that: Understanding How Search Engines Work (Part 1).

Internal links can help lead crawlers to other parts of the website. You see, if there are NO internal links in a page, the website crawlers will leave. Remember, crawlers are not programed to forcibly look for other pages. Once it cannot anymore see internal links within a page, then it will move on and scan the next website on its list.

So, as a website owner, your one important job is to create a internal linking system so that website crawlers can easily scan your website. Help users and crawlers to jump from one page to another without any problems.

Other than that, internal links can help boost your unpopular pages. Let’s say, you have a high ranking page. Of course, this page is popular among users so you can use this as an entry point for other people to discover more pages within your site.

Look at Wikipedia!

If you the ideal example of a great internal linking system, just go to Wikipedia. Look closely and you will see numerous internal links in every Wikipedia page. One topic can lead you to more explanation and further readings.  Once you click certain keywords, you will be redirected to another page in the Wikipedia world.

Even though anchor texts were already present ever since the beginning of the Internet era, there are still many people who fail to optimize their site’s numerous anchor texts. Many fail to apply the best practices when creating anchor texts. Remember, formulating your anchor texts well can help your website in various ways:

1. The anchor texts for your internal links can aid in figuring out the website structure.
2. If you optimize your anchor texts with the keywords that you are ranking for, your website will definitely rank higher.
3. Anchor text for your external links will help users decide if it is a link that they want to click or not.

Choose the right words.

You should always strive to use relevant words as your anchor text. For it to be effective, an anchor text should give the users an overview of what to expect when he / she will click the link.

So, when selecting an anchor text for your link, you should do the following:

• Never use texts that are not connected to the linked content.
• Refrain from using generic terms such as click here, read more here, more details, and so on. These words are vague and too common. It may not even tell the search engines what the linked page is all about.

As much as possible, never use a link as an anchor text.

In some websites, there are no anchor texts. The links are used as the anchor text. However, using the URL of a page may not be the solution. So, use URLs (or Naked URLs) only when it is needed. Instead, the page title still is the best type of anchor text.

Keep your anchor text short and simple.

The more words you use, the more chances of making a mistake. Thus, it is best to keep your anchor texts brief and concise. The shorter, the better. Search engines won’t have a difficulty understanding it.

A good anchor text:

<a href=”https://www.phoenixsearchengineoptimization.com/does-my-website-need-a-sitemap-what-are-sitemaps-anyway/”>What are sitemaps?</a>

A bad anchor text:

<a href=”https://www.phoenixsearchengineoptimization.com/does-my-website-need-a-sitemap-what-are-sitemaps-anyway/”>A sitemap, usually .XML in format, is a file wherein all the website’s contents are listed.</a>

Anchor texts should be distinct than your usual texts.

Clickable links should be easy to decipher. On first glance, the users should be able to know if that text is a link or not. To be sure that your anchor texts are distinct, use a different color to make it stand out from your usual texts.

Anchor Texts and SEO

As I previously discussed on Understanding the Connection Between Anchor Text and SEO, anchor texts are important. Links pointing to your website is an essential ranking factor. When search engines see links pointing to your website, it means that this specific link is a ‘votes of confidence’.

A website that has many links pointing to it will surely rank higher than those websites with no links. This process of gaining backlinks for your website is what you call off-page SEO. More on: 5 More Surefire Techniques in Developing Backlinks.

Next? 6 Tips in Order to not Over Optimize Your Anchor Texts

SOURCE: (1)

Most of the time, migrations fail because of these 7 common reasons.

These include the following:

• Did not set clear goals and objectives ahead of time.
• Insufficient time and resources because of poor planning.
• Did not specify the scope of the migration.
• Only asking for help when major decisions have already been made. SEO firms should be notified even on the planning stage.
• Unexpected web design changes that affected the content.
• No time allotted of testing and fixing bugs.
• Did not anticipate the updates made by Google.

Strategize ahead of time.

You need to understand that migration is NOT always technical. More than the SEO, you also need to assess the results you want to achieve.

Ask yourself, what do I want to happen for my website? What are desired results in this migration process? For most websites, it’s really about growth and moving forward.

Whatever your reasons are, know the risks ahead. For sure, each type of migration – whether you are changing domain names or moving to a new platform – has its own set of problems. Thus, it is important to consult your customers or clients first before making huge website changes.

Little details count.

When it comes to planning, be very specific. It’s not enough to set vague goals. Take time to set boundaries and lay out the scope of your plan.

To be able avoid setbacks, it’s important to set realistic expectations and provide an estimation of how long each task should take. By doing this, you very well know what are the things within your control and what aren’t.

So, schedule ahead of time and anticipate certain problems. Try to allocate time because there could be delays due to the holidays or the Christmas break. People would be very busy at this time. It would be very impractical to launch your site when the festive holidays are happening. Instead, do it before Thanksgiving so you will still have time to correct some bugs. If not, website traffic and sales for Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Christmas will surely be affected.

There are things that are out of your control.

Despite planning ahead, there will be things that are beyond your control. You cannot predict when Google will publish a new update or when your host provider will encounter outages. These things – and more – are few of the unexpected things you will experience. Hence, you can’t do anything and just prepare your best weapons. Soon or later, you will encounter unforeseen circumstances that are totally unavoidable.

If you need help, ask immediately.

SEO migrations do not happen instantly. It is a combination of various efforts. Sometimes, it’s too late for SEO firms to help your website because you did not involve them early on.

Thus, it is important to ask for professional help and involve them in the various critical decisions. Usually, these decisions are not even on the website itself and yet it will impact the future performance. So, be careful on doing it on your own. Before applying any significant chances, take time to test and consult people first. Otherwise, it will very difficult to undo and restore the website’s original state.