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Popularity: 1% [?]

(photo by Swiv)

Although you can have a blog that looks really great, if it doesn’t have any substance, people are not going to return to your blog or subscribe to your RSS feed. Therefore, since the posts that you publish are the substance of your blog, it makes sense that you would want to make them as good as possible. There are a lot of different ways to accomplish this, and we are going to discuss a handful of them right now:

Create a List:
If you are having a hard time thinking of what kind of post you want to create next, list posts are always a great choice. There are several reasons why I recommend this type of post:

Appeals to Social Media Users
If you look at the popular pages of websites like Digg and Reddit, you will see that lists comprise a significant percentage of the content that people like to vote on. Since you already know that these are the kinds of websites that can send you a lot of traffic, it makes sense to write content that’s going to appeal directly to the people who are using these websites.

Attracts Links
When someone links to you, they are basically casting a vote and saying that they think you have something worthwhile to offer to others. Not only can attracting links help your search engine rankings, but it can also send visitors directly to your blog from another blog or website. Because lists are viewed as resources, they are quite likely to attract links.

Easy
Regardless of how passionate you are about the subject of your blog, I know that there are times when you simply don’t have the energy to sit down and write a 1000 word post. Fortunately, lists are quite easy to create; you just need to invest some time in surfing around and putting together a collection of resources.

Install WP-PostRatings:
By installing this plugin on your blog, you are accomplishing two things. First, you are encouraging your visitors to participate with your blog. Second, you can find out what people really want to read about. You may think that a post you wrote is great, but if it gets a lot of low votes, you will know that you should probably avoid that specific topic in future posts.

Use Images:
Images can be a very powerful way to get people’s attention. If someone is surfing around and an image suddenly catches their attention, there is a very good chance that they are going to stick around long enough to read what the content associated with that image has to say.

Proofread and Spellcheck:
While I realize that bloggers aren’t expected to have perfect grammar, it is useful to read over your posts and correct any errors before publishing. Additionally, given the fact that WordPress has a built-in spellcheck function, correcting any misspellings requires less than a minute of extra work.

Popularity: 3% [?]

(photo by -=Ben=-)

Although I have made a post on Web Tools for SEO-Newbies and the Top 5 FireFox Add-ons for Enhanced & Efficient Multi-Tasking, I just recently realized that I haven’t made a post that discusses the best Firefox add-ons for Internet marketers and SEOs.

So, without further ado, let’s dive right into the six best Firefox add-ons for SEOs:

SEO for Firefox: With a name like SEO for Firefox, this add-on has set the bar quite high for itself. However, because it was created by SEO expert Aaron Wall (who is best known as the creator of SEO Book), this add-on lives up to its name and is truly an invaluable tool for any SEO. When I got started in the SEO world, this is one of the first add-ons that I downloaded, and it is still the one that I use the most often. Here are some of the features that make this add-on so great:

-Access the PageRank, Domain Age, Yahoo! Links, Google Cache Dates, WhoIs and more of any website or web page with two clicks of your mouse.

-Have this same set of information (which is fully customizable) added to Google and Yahoo SERPs (can be turned on and off by clicking an icon at the bottom right hand corner of the browser).

-Is updated on a regular basis by Aaron and his developer

SEO Link Analysis: Like SEO for Firefox, this tool was created by another respected name in the SEO community. In addition to this add-on, I recommend taking a look at the other SEO Tools Joost de Valk has created.

The best feature of the SEO Link Analysis add-on is that it gives you the ability to see what anchor text is used for specific incoming links. This tool also gives you the PageRank of the inbound links, along with whether or not they have thenofollow attribute added to them.

Web Developer: Unlike the first two add-ons, this one does not have the word SEO in its title. However, don’t let the name fool you; the Web Developer is an amazing add-on forSEOs. Although this add-on is packed with features, some of the key ones for SEOs include the ability to disable CSS style sheets (which can be useful for tracking down hidden links), seeing how the ALT attribute is used on a page and viewing information for specific cookies.

(photo by ghb624)

Search Status: While this add-on has multiple features that you may find interesting, my favorite aspect of it is the information that is added to status bar. Not only can you see the PageRank of a website or page, but you can also see it’s Compete ranking, along with having the ability to visit it’s Compete graph with just two clicks.

Disable Personalized Search: Created by the same individual behind the SEO Link Analysis add-on, Disable Personalized Search is an easy way to ensure that when you are evaluating GoogleSERPs , you are seeing the default results, and not allowing your personal browsing history to influence the results that being displayed.

SearchBoth.com: Since they both provide useful information, there are probably times when you review the same SERPs in Google and Yahoo. Instead of switching back and forth between these two search engines, you can use the SearchBoth.com add-on to display both sets of SERPS next to each other and in the same window.

Popularity: 8% [?]

Although it doesn’t cost you a dime to use, Google Analytics is an extremely powerful tool. While it’s not perfect (but I would venture to say that even expensive analytics solution aren’t one hundred percent perfect), you can gain so much information about your website by looking at the data provided by Google Analytics. While some people use it for nothing more than seeing how many visitors andpageviews they get everyday, if you are serious about taking advantage of the data provided by Google Analytics, I have three ways to get more out of this program.

Social Media Metrics Greasemonkey Plugin: I’m kicking off the post with this plugin because it is one the most useful (and coolest) add-ons for any program that I have come across. Before I explain what it does, let me tell you what you need to use it. While it’s completely free to use, you will need to use the Firefox browser (which, as someone with an interest in search engine marketing and the Internet in general, you should already be using). Additionally, you need to download and install Greasemonkey for Firefox (which is a free add-on that allows you to customize certain things within your browser by using small bits of JavaScript).

Once you’ve installed Greasemonkey for Firefox, you can add the Social Media Metrics plugin. As you can see from the screenshot above, this awesome plugin adds additional data to your Google Analytics interface. All you have to do is navigate to a specific Content Detail page, and in addition to the standard information provided by Google Analytics, you will be able to see the number of votes for that piece of content fromDigg, Sphinn, Mixx and Reddit. You also get the number of delicious saves, the amount of reviews on StumbleUpon and the number of backlinks (according to Yahoo) that are pointing to that page.

Keyword Trends in Google Analytics: Like the Social Media Metrics plugin, Keyword Trends uses Firefox andGreasemonkey to enhance your Google Analytics experience. This really cool script allows you to see the changes that are taking place in the traffic that is being sent to your website. Not only will the tool show you the keywords with twenty percent higher traffic over the last seven days, but it will also show you keywords with twenty percent lower traffic over the last seven days.

This information is not only useful in regards to your SEO efforts, but also in understanding potential changes or trends in how visitors are searching for the information that you have to offer.

Combine Google Website Optimizer and Analytics: While this last item is not aGreasemonkey script, it can be just as useful as the first two items on the list. As you probably already know, Google Website Optimizer allows you tofind out how different versions of your website and landing pages perform. With this handy script (which is uploaded to your server), you will be able to combine the information provided by Google Website Optimizer and Google Analytics, which will give you an even deeper insight into how to maximize the effectiveness of your website.

Popularity: 7% [?]

As search engines continue to evolve, so does the field of search engine optimization. Although a technique may work extremely well for awhile, there are manySEO techniques that eventually become obsolete. For example, there was a point in time when a site could rank well if it was submitted to enough web directories. While there are still some quality web directories out there (which we will discuss in a future post), the major search engines have devalued the links from a large percentage of web directories.

Although many techniques do become obsolete, there are other SEO techniques that still work as well today as they did five years ago. One of the best examples of a technique that is still very effective is the link request. If you can get other bloggers and webmasters to provide a one-way link to your blog or website, you are gaining a very powerful boost to yourSEO efforts.

However, the problem is that most people don’t know how to properly ask for a link, and instead of getting a great one-way link from a trusted source, their request gets deleted or marked as spam by the recipient.

In order to maximize the effectiveness of your future link requests, here a handful of guidelines that you should always strive to follow:

Establish a Relationship: If possible, before you ask for a link, establish a relationship with the person you are planning to ask. While this may not work for a static website, it is usually quite easy with blogs (since the authors are much more active online). In addition to leaving interesting comments on their blog, you can also chat with a blogger through email or instant messaging. When you are communicating, really focus on a building a genuine online friendship with this person.

Remember that the Title Matters: I can’t count how many times I have received an email with a subject along the lines of “Link to Me” or “Go to My Website.” I receive these emails on a regular basis, and all of them are sent directly to my trash folder.

When you sit down to write your link request, remember that you need to come up with an interesting title. If you haven’t had previous contact with the person you are sending the request to, this step is especially important. What you come up with will depend on your specific situation, but titles that have worked for me in the past include “I was wondering about [insert the title of one of their blog posts or articles]” or “I have a question about [the name of their blog or website].”

Be Personal: Whether you have had previous contact with the recipient or not, you need to make your email personalized. In addition to using their name (instead of Dear Blogger or Webmaster), you should be open with your identity. This includes introducing yourself (if you haven’t had previous contact) and providing multiple contact details (website URL, phone number, etc).

Remember to Give and Take: When you send a link request, you are simply asking a blogger or webmaster to give you a free link. Therefore, to avoid being rude, you need to let them know what you are offering in return. Just like the second guideline in this list, what you have to offer will depend on the specific situation. However, one of the easiest ways to have something to offer is to write a piece of content that will benefit their audience, and then ask for them to link to that specific piece of content.

As an example, if you read a blog post that has a question at the end of it, you may want to do the necessary research to answer that question and then send a link request to the blogger letting them know that you published the answer to their question.

Popularity: 15% [?]