Getting your onsite SEO right

The recent Google algorithm updates (Panda, Penguin) are clearly showing that despite all the SEO efforts businesses display, any website is at the mercy of a change of rules by the search engines, and particularly Google.
This does not mean that you should give up on SEO, but it simply emphasises the fact that clean/ethical/white hat SEO is now even more important than ever. Do not over optimise, do not buy links, think quality more than quantity.
With this in mind, now is the perfect time to get your onsite optimisation right (or review it)

The onsite/offsite optimisation debate

 

In the past 5 years, link building has taken more importance in the search algorithms, so much so that some figures suggest that it now accounts for 60 to 70% of a website's rankings. The incorporation of social signals and development of new social networks has accelerated this trend further in the past 2-3 years.
While no one can argue with these numbers, I have observed a worrying trend with a lot of my clients recently: they seem to completely neglect onsite optimisation at the benefit of link building.

Ideally for a natural organic growth, both activities need to be undertaken at the same time, and without good onsite SEO, it is very likely that your website will not rank well in search engines, especially if you're a new/growing business without a lot of brand recognition/awareness.

So my advice has always been the following: get your onsite SEO right or it will cost you. And from a resource standpoint, it is much easier and often quicker to get your site optimised than it is to acquire good quality backlinks.

Google Analytics update - browser size analysis

Google is going full steam ahead with the development of Google Analytics, its own free web analytics tool, at the moment.

Browser size analysis

I discovered this new function while reading a TechCrunch article, and thought it was worth spending a bit of time writing about it.

This new tool is available (or should be shortly) under the Content > In page analytics menu in the GA interface. To use it, just click on the new "Browser size" button on the right hand side of your screen, right next to the "Show bubbles" and "Show colours" buttons

 

So long Website Optimizer....

....and welcome Content Experiments!
I received an email from Google yesterday confirming that as of August 1st, 2012, Google Website Optimizer will disappear and be replaced by new functionality in Google Analytics - Content experiments.

If you're into Conversion Rate Optimisation (CRO) and website testing (and if you're not you should be), then this is great news. Google's recent will to provide a better integration between all of its free tools now gives you the ability to manage your content tests/experiments directly from your GA interface.

As you can see from the screenshot below, the new service can already be found under the Content > Experiments menu in your standard GA interface:

So now you have no more excuses not to run tests to improve your website's performance, whether it is a simple A/B test or a more comprehensive Multi variate test (MVT). Read more on A/B testing >