Need help from SEO experts I believe SEO is dead

[sunusiko]

Hello, I got 2 sites and I need help for both because SEO just aint working.

My main problem is in my main site, I am google dancing between top 6-25 but I got no idea why IM not N#1.

My site:
850 backlinks
50% Nofollow 50% Dofollow
13% anchor for my keyword=110 backlinks for that keyword
diversified backlinks, articles ,blog comments, social bookmarks,press release , etc
PR 2
2 months old


My competitor:
60 backlinks,LOSING 1 Backlink per month.
80% Dofollow 20% Nofollow
70% anchor for that keyword=50 backlinks for the keyword.
Has Domain matching keyword.
PR2
2 Years old


Lets compare:
I got 790 more backlinks than him.
I mantain balance between Dofollow and Nofollow while he doesn't
I got low % of anchor text for my keyword while he has 70% it pretty much proves that spamming your keyword doesn't do **** to affect negatively.
I got more backlinks with the keyword (110) while he only has 50
He has same domain as keyword
Both have PR 2
His site is 1 year and 8 months older than mine.
So wtf is wrong?

[tstolber]

My site:
850 backlinks
50% Nofollow 50% Dofollow
13% anchor for my keyword=110 backlinks for that keyword
diversified backlinks, articles ,blog comments, social bookmarks,press release , etc
PR 2
2 months old


My competitor:
60 backlinks,LOSING 1 Backlink per month.
80% Dofollow 20% Nofollow
70% anchor for that keyword=50 backlinks for the keyword.
Has Domain matching keyword.
PR2
2 Years old

The number of links is insignificant when compared to the quality and relevance of the links.
"Maintaining" a 50/50 ratio between nofollow and followed links is not a good strategy. Sites that rank highly for competitive terms tend to have much lower (10-20%) nofollow links in their back link profile.
The EMD of your competitor is an issue I am sure and hasn't been fully dealt with yet IMO.
Your site is very new, where as your competitor's site is well established. Links also gain authority the longer they are kept in place.

There are many reasons, but if most of you 110 keyword matching links are from low quality and or nofollow links then this is not surprising at all.

Post a URL and a keyword and some further analysis can be done.

[inishmaan]

I don't know what kind of site you have but it seems to me that the tech details have become less important. I have a formerly very profitable site that got whacked in Penguin. It listed online degree schools, but it seems to me as though Google has chosen to put all the schools on top of the rankings - particularly the ones who buy alot of advertising from them - and push any "intermediary" type site down. These are tough times for small publishers.

[joshz]

So, just because your links are lower quality than your competition you assume SEO is dead?

Numbers don't matter. Quality does.

I've seen sites outrank sites with 10k links with a few dozen powerful links.

[canuckjgc]

I've found you need at least one or two links from high trust authority sites (rather than just high PR). A few of those go a long way.

[realityhack]

...I got no idea why IM not N#1.

Because Google doesn't think you are the best.
Which typically means:
a) People don't think you are the best
b) You aren't better enough for anyone to care
c) Nobody cares about that type of site / keyword combination / etc.

SEO is far from dead. In fact your efforts may explain why you have made it as high as #6 when otherwise you might never have made the top 30. But it is a LOT easier to push up a site that gets natural attention vs. one that doesn't.

I am a picky base..tard who hates everything.
Can you honestly say that you have something *I* would want to read/use/etc? Because that is how you make me link to your site after I view it. And that is how you keep up with or beat people who are getting links from visitors.

[vimal26]

well actually we cant say SEO is dead totally but yeah ad far as ranking is concerned then SEO doesn't taken in consideration and this most probably happen after atest Google Panda rollout

[Doodled]

What is dead is the type of SEO you are doing. Counting backlinks in numbers and all that jazz!

[Sinclairos]

"Maintaining" a 50/50 ratio between nofollow and followed links is not a good strategy. Sites that rank highly for competitive terms tend to have much lower (10-20%) nofollow links in their back link profile.

hey tstolber, can you say that last line again, i didnt quite understand.

[pamela2013]

I dont know if its dead or not but a lot of it seems to be down to personal opinion. You can get three different SEO guys and they will give three different answers. There is no 'best practice' as far as I can tell so its a case of change something and see what happens.

[Sinclairos]

I dont know if its dead or not but a lot of it seems to be down to personal opinion. You can get three different SEO guys and they will give three different answers. There is no 'best practice' as far as I can tell so its a case of change something and see what happens.

there is some truth in this and differences in opinion may be formed from different case studies we have done. As google never really gives you any answers of any value, its up to us to interpret what it wants, + exchange ideas and thoughts in forums like this.

[realityhack]

There is no 'best practice' as far as I can tell so its a case of change something and see what happens.

Testing things IS a best practice. And that goes for all marketing not just SEO.
Test an SEO strategy
Test an SEO company
Test a PPC ad wording
Test a PPC biding strategy
Test the wording on your site
Test the images on your site
Test a new product line
Test new packaging

There are general guidelines to SEO. There is a solid list of things that if you do them will eventually screw you. Just like breaking the law in producing your product.
There is also a solid list of things that will likely help you even if you don't immediately notice the changes.

Step one is making sure you don't hit any of the 'absolute no-nos'. From there you can look at what may work for your site.

[pamela2013]

Testing things is not a best practice when you are paying an seo 'expert' hundreds of dollars per week its a recipe for disaster. Google update their search algorithm every few months...the only people benefitting are seo 'experts' who are laughing all the way to the bank. Ask an seo expert for results like a graph showing them take a site from 500 to 5 in Google....im yet to find one. Would love to see ROI on seo's overall.

[SEO_AM]

Pamela2013... In most things when it comes to business... it is better to hire a known and trusted expert than to bet your business on an intelligent untested amateur/business owner. That amateur/owner may succede, but, the statistics still say that 80% of all small businesses go bankrupt primarily due to mis-management by those same amateurs. When a business goes bankrupt... the product, service, idea is not destroyed or lost... the invested money and time is. If I am not expert enough, I always find the best experts I can afford.

[CharliesSEO]

By just reading this post i fully understand why you're not #1 - Your grammar, punctuation and general content writing is awful "aint" rather than "is not" for example.

Google's #1 fetish at the moment is Content, i've ranked websites to top 5 for purely unique content and a internal linking.