Wedding SEO and Internet Marketing Blog

How do I get more hits on my website?

Well, if you are looking to get more hits to your website, there are many different approaches you can take.  While it is easy to just pay for traffic to your website, not everyone is in a position to do that.  Plus paid traffic can be a very dangerous endeavor if you do not know exactly what you are doing.

Building free traffic to your website takes some time and work.  One of the most important aspects of a website is content.  You need many pages of content on your website, loaded with information.  It is very important that these pages get indexed by Google.  When your page is indexed, people can get to it by doing a Google search on one of your keywords.  A keyword is a term used to retrieve documents in an information system such as a catalog or a search engine.

In order to get indexed on google, you need to have some backlinks pointing to your site.  Backlinks are any link on another side that, when clicked on, will take the user to your website.  One great, free way of getting these is by using social bookmarks.  Digg, Stumble, and Delicious are some great sites where you can social bookmark the pages of your website.  All you need to do is go to their webpage and submit the links to your site.  You also need to submit some keywords and a description to the site.  You will get some short-term traffic just by submitting your website, but the long-term advantage is that your page will climb the pages of google when you submit more and more quality backlinks.

Once you get your page indexed by Google, just keep finding more ways to post links to your site.  You can post them in your signature in forums.  The more links, the better.  This will help you move to the top of the search engine results pages of Google and increase your percentage of quality bridal leads.

Let me begin today’s post with my apology.  Yesterday, when I published the two tutorial videos, I didn’t realize that I had a maximum bandwidth of only 2GB, which caused problems for many of you trying to watch. Sorry!!  I’ am currently working on a better solution for video, and will re-post the first tutorial’s again shortly.  Online Video is essential on today’s world wide web, and you can expect a lot more Video’s posted on my blog.

I also wanted to learn more about YOUR questions and YOUR concerns when it comes to Internet Marketing and SEO with a simple 1 question survey.  Special Thanks to those that have participated.  Your questions and concerns are very important to me, and provides me with new dialog/topics to blog about.   My goal for this blog is to become an open forum to share ideas, case studies, and success among the Wedding Internet Marketing Community. So without further due, here are the results:

Question: What is your single biggest question about Internet Marketing? (I only picked 2o for now)

1. The Cost
2. Specifics, specifics, specifics, like location, location, location. You seo guys talk in generalities. Give specifics of what your talking about. We mere mortals don’t understand all the terms in computers and the world of “seo”. The videos I just watched were not very good, very confusing following the pointer. It also didn’t sound like you were very prepared. The videos were short and part 1 ended abruptly and I wasn’t sure what I was suppose to do next. Maybe your on that learning curve yourself.
3. How can I reach the right Brides through the internet.
4. Sorry, that’s just too broad a question for me.
5. How can I reach more people with my message in the most cost efficient way possible?
6. Finding the right keywords for my field–the DJ business
7. How do we get to the top of the Search lists?
8. How can I qualify more good leads?
9. Our business is a bit different non obvious. I wish i knew what major music act tour managers search for on google when they come to town. Is there a way to find out what people search for when they actually find it?
10. Interesting blog… keep it up… look forward to reading more.
11. are there any downsides?
12. How can I get 1st placement on Google without paying for the privilege?
13. How can I make major changes to my Home Page without without reducing the effectiveness of the existing SEO – especially with Google?
14. How do I get more hits for my websites?
15. Is anyone in the “SEO business” not a crook, a liar, or a blowhard?
16. What is the best way to beat out competition when marketing in the internet?
17. I don’t really have any questions because I’m learning from the same people you are. I’m mostly just following along because you are tailoring this to the wedding market which I am a part of. I’d also like your perspective in general and I like the fact that you ran a successful wedding/event business out of Vegas.
18. What step should I take to get higher SEO position on Google?
19. What are some immediate steps I could take to get my website to rank higher with Google, Yahoo, ETC.?
20. I want to know more about Google and how I can be at the top.
    

These are all GREAT questions and comments.  Everyday I will pick one of these issues and elaborate more on the subject and do my best to answer them in layman’s terms.  Please feel free to add your comments to the bottom of this post, if you have more questions or concerns related to Internet Marketing and SEO.

Best Wishes

-Jason Hennessey

Sometimes the best way to learn is to watch.  Therefor, I have decided to review a few randomly selected Websites for FREE and post a tutorial video below.  As I continue to review more and more websites, I might start to sound redundant.  Saying the same things over and over for every review.  Why?  Simply because there is no Magic SEO  Wand that you wave over your site, which brings more traffic.  Basically it comes down to unique content, and links (thousands of links).  Yes there are some rules that you must play by, and that will be my job to teach you how to play fair.  Follow me daily, learn 1 more thing, apply it to your website, and WHAM…..you have found the Magic of SEO.

FIRST SEO REVIEW

Domain: http://www.thebridalstudiosa.com/

Owner: Pam

Keyword: San Antonio Wedding Planner

Video (part 1)

Video (part 2)

Recap:

• Change the Title of the Page to San Antonio Wedding Planner | The Bridal Studio
• Add More Content to your pages, and include keywords like San Antonio Wedding Planner, San Antonio Bridal Consultant, San Antonio Wedding Expert
• Get a FREE Word Press blog immediately and start adding unique content every day with the keywords that will drive more relevant bridal traffic to your website.  Or outsource the content creation to India for $5.00 an article.
• Start submitting unique articles to FREE article Directories, sites like http://www.ezinearticles.com, and http://www.articlesbase.com.  Be sure to include your keyword (San Antonio Wedding Planner) 2-3 different times in the article and have them link back to your website….i.e. San Antonio Wedding Planner.  By the way…this link just helped you!!
• Go to http: www.PRWeb.com and create a Press Release with a subject pertaining to your Keyword.   Something like: Recession is really starting to hit home with San Antonio Wedding Planners.  This will cost you $200.00, but get you a TON of links quickly.  Depending on your budget, I would do this a few times a year, more if possible.

On a side Note:  I would also suggest that you add some video to your site.  It WONT increase your traffic, however it WILL establish trust.

Talk to everyone tomorrow.

-Jason

Let me start off by saying Thank you for all the kind words. There is absolutely no angle here, I’m not trying to sell you anything, not looking for you to donate a dollar, just looking to pass on EFFECTIVE Internet Marketing strategies to bring more brides to your websites, and put that much more $$ in your pockets. Times are very tough and us wedding vendors need to stick together and weather the storm. So with that being said, lets start the learning…By the way, I apologize to anyone who knows a little about SEO, I will assume that EVERYONE is a beginner

So What is SEO?

Great!! Now that everyone knows the definition (blue print), now we must build the house.  But before you can build the house, you need your tools.  So here is what we need to get.

MOZILLA FIREFOX BROWSER Delete Internet Explorer forever (so many issues/viruses with the IE Browser.

THE GOOGLE TOOLBAR

The Google Tool bar is an add-on which allows you to show love to Google and assist them with their distributed computing project to help scientific research. By showing Google some love, they just might do the same for you.  It also demonstrates Page Rank (PR) for all websites that you visit.  Page Rank is basically a popularity score ranging from 0 to 10.  What is your Page Rank?  Obviously the higher the better.  We will get into Page Rank as we get deeper into the education.

SEO TOOL FOR FIREFOX. download it for free

No watch this short video – things might not make sense to you, but just get a basic understanding.

Great!! Now that you have some of the basic tools, and there will be many more trips to home depot (for more tools), we can now start with some of the basics.

How do Search Engines Work?

The first lesson in SEO that you will need to learn is that Search Engines are not humans.  While this might be very obvious, the difference between how many search engines and humans view web pages aren’t.  Not like humans, search engines are text driven.  Search Engines spend 24 hours a day crawling the web, looking for text to get an idea what a site is about. Keep in mind this is a brief explanation – Search engines also follow advanced algorithms while crawling, indexing, caching, processing, calculating, and retrieving.

The first thing a search engine does is crawl the web to look for fresh information (content). This is known as a crawler, spider, or Googlebot.  Spiders spend time following links from one page to another and index anything and everything that they find on their voyage.  Now remember, there are over 30 Billion pages on the web, therefore it is impossible for a spider to visit your website daily to see if it has been modified.  Sometimes a crawler may not visit your site for up to three months, so during this time your SEO efforts WILL NOT be rewarded.  But there really isn’t anything you can do about it.

What you can do is learn something new everyday on this blog, and apply it to your website.  Remember crawlers are not humans and they don’t see images, javascript, frames, flash movies, & password-protected pages.  They ONLY see text.  This is the reason why you never see a fancy flash website sharing in the first positions of Google, Yahoo, or MSN.

Google, Yahoo!, and MSN may seem very similar, however they are VERY different engines, following different guidelines (algorithms).   For example, Yahoo! and MSN, on-page keyword factors are of primary importance, while Google puts a lot more weight on links.  Also Google prefers their sites like wine, the older, the better, while Yahoo & MSN don’t really take into factor the age of a specific domain.  Therefore you might need more time until your site sits in the top position in Google compared to Yahoo!.

That should be enough for today.  So much more to come in the coming days, weeks, years.

By the way please feel free to tell your friends about this blog.  Think of it as a gift that keeps giving, and they will think of YOU when they have business to refer.

Notice how I emphasized the word “YOUR”.

Who am I and why should you trust me?

Jason Hennessey

I’ am not some great success story, and I never got rich quick. I simply started a local DJ business in Las Vegas, at the young age of 19. My name is Jason Hennessey.  It’s a funny story, and I will try to share it with you quickly.  In 1999, I  had 1 year left in the United States Air Force, and although proud to serve my country, I had no intention of reenlisting.  I wanted to do something that I was more passionate about.  Music was my love.  So I bought some equipment, and started to teach myself how to DJ.  The next thing I noticed, I was playing at friend’s informal parties, school dances, and then the million dollar question came. “Would you like to DJ my sister’s Wedding?” I was taken by surprise, and had SO many unsure questions going through my head.  What if I mess up someone’s name during an announcement?  What if the CD scratches during their first dance?  What if …..??? I was filled with so much uncertainty,  however I  realized that this could be a very large OPPORTUNITY.

The next few weeks were extremely stressful leading up to the big day, but I nailed it.  Compliments, thank you’s, referrals, I said to myself ”this is the world I want to be in!”  What other job would offer a 19 year old the opportunity to go out play music, socialize, eat gourmet meals, all while collecting over $500.00 for 4 hours of work?  It seemed too good to be true.  So to make a long story short, I busted my BUTT building one of the largest DJ, Photo & Videography companies in Las Vegas “The Wedding Capital of the World”.  When I sold the company in 2007, we had over 16 sound systems, 4 full time photographers, and a talented team of video editors.  Not to mention referrals from every major hotel and casino on the Las Vegas Strip.

Here it comes……Why did you sell a successful business?  Simply because I wanted to spend more time with my beautiful family, and build something that would someday change the way weddings are planned online.  I will get more into that as I continue to blog.  But I promise….I will NEVER try to sell you anything.  This BLOG is strictly for FUN, PROFESSIONAL, and EXPERT advice on how to book more wedding business using the internet.

What are some of the things I will share with you?

Well put it this way.  Through my years of trials and tribulations, I have always found my strength to be networking.  Today, I’ am fortunate to be involved in a business venture with one of the most respected names in Internet Marketing.  As a matter of fact, I moved the entire family across country from the neon lights of Las Vegas to Dacula, GA to be closer to him.   Although the  highlight of my week is now the Waffle House on Saturdays, I now enjoy much more quality family time, and the opportunity to be mentored by an individual who once made $14 Million dollars in 24 hours with a computer and internet connection.

His name is Brad Fallon, a leading seo expert.  Over the past 2 months, I have learned techniques that they just can’t teach you in college, tactics that fortune 500 companies pay him upwards of twenty thousand dollars in professional consulting fees.  I mean the stuff that makes your heads spin, leaving you saying…..”If I only knew this stuff 5 years ago, how much more successful my business would have been today.” And I feel it is a duty of mine to capture the knowledge learned, and share it with the industry that gave me MY opportunity.

If I can just help each and every one of you book one additional wedding this year, then all of this blogging was worth it.  My goal however, is to increase your wedding business by nothing less than 10%.  I have also listed my personal email address on the contact us page.  PLEASE feel free to send me feedback, your questions, or simply pass on a quick hello.  I’m here to help, and will be doing so by blogging on the following internet marketing subjects:

• Writing educational blog post daily.
• SEO / on page & off page optimization.
• Providing links to useful online marketing tools.
• Teaching you about the Google algorithm.
• Step by step methods to effectively leverage a blog.
• Get you more quality inbound wedding related links.
• Case Studies and Market Research
• Wedding Treads – and how to stay ahead of the curve
• Guest Blogger’s
• Q&A sessions
• Informational Video’s
• Webinars
• Website Reviews
• And so much more…

So do yourself a favor.  Pick up a marble notebook and a .25 folder; and get ready to INCREASE YOUR WEDDING BOOKINGS. Be sure to log in and check the blog daily.  If you are extremely busy, log in, print the post, and read it when you have an extra 10 minutes at night before going to sleep.  After you have read the post, highlight important elements, and take immediate action the next morning.  You will start to establish greater internet presence, and stay ahead of your competition.  I will try my best to have all new content posted daily by 4:00pm E.S.T .

So, as for a conclusion…  I truly look forward to building one on one relationship with each and every one of you.  The knowledge I have learned in the past and will continue to absorb in the future will be passed on to you via the internet (probably your new best friend).

Best regards

-Jason Hennessey
Your Everyday Wedding Vendor that wants to share his love and knowledge for internet marketing