a plea for help for my scout site...

Hi all,

I have read a littleover the internet about SEO but do not claim to be technical at all,
so please don't flame me!

I am a Scout Leader for an explorer scout group (14 to 18 year olds) in the UK.

We are creating 2 web sites - one for our Explorers which is at www.montaguesu.org and
one for our beavers, cubs and scouts - www.1stdatchetseascouts.org

We have pretty much got the www.montaguesu.org one up and running but I really need to
get it near the top or at the top in google if anyone searches for Scouts or Explorers or Explorer Scouts in the following locations:

Wraysbury, Datchet, Langley, slough, windsor, old windsor, Eton.

when I have this sussed I will replicate the technique and most of the site content of www.montaguesu.org onto
the scouts one www.1stdatchetseascouts.org.

We are in google but we almost never show up on the first page.....I have plenty of the keywords on our first page and our about us page
and also put them in the meta keywords. I also submitted the site to the right sectiosn in DMOZ and yahoo.

We also have a fair few links from scouting related sites.

I must be missing a trick though!!! Please help - I mean if you do a search for datchet scouts on google a little site for 2nd datchet scouts shows up!

Which is no fair!

Well thank you in advance if you agree to help us get our scouting site better explosure and assist us in getting new members.

Stuart
Montagu Explorer leader
www.montaguesu.org

Is it possible to submit to more than one DMOZ catagory then?

Also what do you mean by clean up the markup?

Also not sure what

means..

Does that mean create a link that says somthing like Explorer Scouts covering Wraysbury, Windsor, Datchet etc and have this link to the home page?

Thanks

Stuart

Sorry to tell you but new sites have to pay their dues and work a bit harder that developed sites. You cant expect to load up a site and rank high. I checked your backlinks for www.montaguesu.org (type link:www.montaguesu.org in Google) and you have none. Google can't gauge your importance if you dont have any sites that link to you saying your important enough to rank well. Build up your backlinks and use various keywords as explained above and link them to the appropraite pages on your site. Each page is a potential doorway so there is no reason to link to only your homepage if you have a more descriptive page on your site for the link.

Once Google indexes your entire site you should have better results but you have to work on your backlinks. Any related directory or site will do fine.

I would suggest going for the smaller words "countryname scouts" because a single term like "scouts" or "explorers" takes alot of time and links. Those terms are also too generic so you'll be getting alot of unwanted traffic like scouts in europe and whatnot.

Thanks all - I will crack on with your advice tomorrow - It seems wierd though I do have other scouting sites linking to us

but doing that search on google does not show them - but if I search for sites containing the term www.montaguesu.org it shows the sites that link to us

eg www.scoutbase.org.uk www.escouts.org.uk etc

Am I doing anything wrong? As I just plain dont get how come they are not showing up as linking when they are?

also you say to clean up the code and give an example of the Meta Keywords - I thought they were imprtant in the rankings - did I get this wrong?

Your confused SEO bumbling amatuer.

Stuart

Google doesnt show links from pages below PR4 but does take them into account. Try to get links from pages PR4 + they will count for your site a lot more.

They'll do ALOT more if they are related. No need to link a acout site from a casino website if you catch my drift. Related website will help your site relate to it's subject.

Its quite possible that your links havent been picked up yet either. google is in whats called a backlink update cycle whereby it publishes new PR and backlinks only every 28-35 days. With the way things are going right now may be even longer!

However just because they arent published yet doesnt mean they dont count. I think links are counted for your rankings well before you see a pixel in the green bar.

Just stick with getting links from related site and you'll do fine.

one of the advantages you have is that your sites target geographical niches so you can approach completely relevant "but non competing" scout sites and get them to link. look for scout sites in Canada or Australia wherever explain the benefit of the link and say hey we can help each other "SEO CHAT SAYS SO"

Good luck

Awsome advice...I am going to go off trawling and see wha tlinks I can find!

Thanks

Stuart