After a long holiday pause, here is a new SEOReview. This time I looked at the website of Marima Cottages (www.marima.com.au), a private spa chalet accommodation within a forest in Pemberton.

1. Can search engines browse through this website properly?

Very well indeed. All the content displayed in the website is totally readible by search engines. There is not much content to grab for the search engines though, but we will get to that later. The webdesigner surely created search engine friendly webpages.

2. Is there enough interesting information for tourists?

Not at all! This is the main improvement for the website. Create interesting information about the city of Pemberton and its surrounding cities and areas. There is already a list of attractions on the website, so create a page for each attraction with pictures and a short introduction. Optimize the webpages for the keywords that people use to find these attractions. People searching for them may end up booking a cottage to stay the night, or longer!

3. Are the webpages optimized for the right keywords?

The webpages are optimized for good keywords, but it seems that the whole website is optimized for “Accommodation Pemberton”. There are so much more keywords that people will use to find your product! Use the Google Keywordtool to find a lot more keywords. Optimize each keyword that you choose for only 1 webpage and start with new keywords for a new webpage. Why is the webpage that lists attractions not optimized for the keyword “Pemberton Attractions”? Optimize your <title> and <meta description> for these keywords.

4. Are there many quality links to your website?

The PageRank of the homepage is 3, which is not terrible. However, there are only 39 links on the internet pointing to the whole website. Whether this is enough or not enough depends on the competition for your keywords. Usually this is a very low count and should be upgraded to 150-200 at least, to get nice results. There are some resources on this blog to upgrade your links amount. You can also Google some keywords for link building.

Good luck and let me know if there is anything I can do to help you with!

This is the second edition of my weekly topic SEOReview. This week the review is about the website of Exclusive London, a webguide about hospitality, lifestyle and food in London, United Kingdom.

What I love about this website is its massive amount of content. Well done guys! The team behind this website has gathered a lot of content about businesses in London. The pages for these businesses are also optimized for keywords so this must give them plenty of traffic already.

1. Can search engines browse through this website properly?

Absolutely. There is no problem for a search engine here. I do have some tips about navigation structure though. I would not hide the content as much. Basicly all the pages that build up a huge website are so hidden for the user and therefore also the search engine. It seems that you can only access the big lists of pages by scrolling down the website and clicking on the small grey links that take you to pages with links to the businesses and more. I would make it better visible and put it into the main menu somehow.

2. Is there enough interesting information for tourists?

There is definitely no lack of information. Just make it more acessible!

3. Are the webpages optimized for the right keywords?

Haven’t checked all 40,000+ pages of course, but the ones that I did check have good optimization for important keywords. This website doesn’t only target the keywords with a lot of competition. They also go for keywords with low search volume and average competition. ExclusiveLondon.co.uk maybe should target a bit more keywords with low volume and low competition for quicker results.

The <title>s and <meta name=description>s just look great. All connected with the right keywords. However, the URLs are not search engine friendly (and therefore also not user friendly). They should change URLs like http://www.exclusivelondon.co.uk/LondonLifeStyle/LifeStyleGuide.aspx?LSCatID=9 to http://www.exclusivelondon.co.uk/LondonLifeStyle/London-Restaurants

At least people will know what they will be visiting. And search engines can retrieve information from these links too.

4. Are there many quality links to your website?

Yahoo! currently says there are over 1,000 webpages linking to the webpages on ExclusiveLondon.co.uk. Many come from social media websites, article directories and blogs. This is absolutely not a bad thing. But ExclusiveLondon.co.uk finds themselves in a terribly high competitive market, so they absolutely need more incoming links from high quality websites.

Building links through forums, directories and social media sites will not help them get to the top for keywords with high search volume and high competition (London hotels, London restaurants, etc.). To achieve this, they need to build unique tools or content that no other website has. Quality tools or information will make it worthy for webmasters to link this website.

This definitely is not your typical hotel or travel website. There is a lot of work waiting for you guys (if you are not satisfied with your current traffic through search engines, of course).

Hope my tips will bring the inspiration you were looking for.

Next week I will be reviewing another travel, tourism or hospitality website. Want your website reviewed? E-mail me at SEOsecretsTravel@gmail.com.

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For more step-by-step methods on getting high rankings in search engines, have a look at my product SEO Secrets for Travel, Tourism & Hospitality.

This is the first edition of my new weekly topic: SEOReview. This week the review is about the website of Country Pleasures, an Australian Bed&Breakfast based in Angaston (South-Australia).

Please note that these reviews are only about SEO and never about the visual experience of a website.

When I open the website there is a nice flash animation that shows some quotes. I assume they are written or told by actual customers. Although it’s a good thing to show what people like, using flash in an intro page is never a good idea for SEO.

1. Can search engines browse through this website properly?

This brings me to tip number 1: Get rid of the introduction page and add the flash animation to the first real webpage with text. Not only are search engines a bit confused about your content (they can’t read flash well), your visitors also will be lost and click away from your website, before opening the real webpages.

2. Is there enough interesting information for tourists?

Tip number 2 is about the text and content on the website. There should be more webpages with interesting information. At this moment there are only 3 webpages.  Country Pleasures needs to create a lot more pages with free information about Angaston and its surroundings. Make it interesting for tourists! Show them why they should choose for Angaston.

3. Are the webpages optimized for the right keywords?

Optimizing the webpages for important keywords is tip number 3. Currently the most important keywords (accommodation Angaston and Angaston hotels) are not optimized on the website. They need to be added to the <title> and <meta name=description> of the first webpage. Find more keywords with the Google AdWords Keyword Tool.

4. Are there many quality links to your website?

The last important tip, number 4, is that Country Pleasures needs to collect a lot more links on other websites, pointing to their webpages. With only 18 incoming links to the current website, search engines will not think the website is important or needs to be listed in search engines for specific keywords.

Get more links by using the methods listed in my older posts:

• Travel Linkbuilding with Google Search
• Quick Start Guide for Travel Linkbuilding

Thanks to Country Pleasures and I hope you will get started with improving your SEO right away.

Next week I will be reviewing another travel, tourism or hospitality website. Want your website reviewed? E-mail me at SEOsecretsTravel@gmail.com.

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For more step-by-step methods on getting high rankings in search engines, have a look at my product SEO Secrets for Travel, Tourism & Hospitality.

Who is ready for a free review on the SEO you have been doing (or need to be doing) for your website?

I will personally check your website on a few points to make sure you are on the right way to achieving high rankings on important keywords.

I will be reviewing the following factors:

• Is your website indexed well by search engines?
• Is your website optimized for keywords?
• Does your website have enough quality content?
• Is your website popular enough in the eyes of a search engine?
• More!

Note: Only websites/blogs related to Travel, Tourism or Hospitality will be reviewed.

I will review 1 website per week and report about it in my blog. Getting a review also means getting a link to your website from this high quality blog ;-)

Send an e-mail to: SEOsecretsTravel@gmail.com with as subject: SEOReview. Send me your name, website URL and please tell me if there’s something particular you want to know more about (Link building, optimizing for keywords, creating content, etc.). If not, that’s fine too.

Get your chance for a free review! Act now. E-mail me!

For now I will only write blogs and record audio for each review. Later on I will be recording video and posting it on the famous video sites as well.

Manny Papadoulis of IconTourism (Perth, Australia) invited me to do an interview with him for one of his live audio sessions (which afterwards are saved as podcasts).

Of course I took on this amazing opportunity to speak to many tourism companies. After making an introduction to what SEO really is, I gave away 5 free of my most important tips for anybody to use.

Tune in here to listen to “5 SEO Tips for Tourism Companies”:

Source: http://instantteleseminar.com/?eventid=7939983

How would you feel if your website would be listed in the top of search engines? Let me show you how to get there.

Today marks a brand new day in the world of search engine optimization: SEO Secrets for Travel, Tourism & Hospitality was launched today! I am so excited, proud and also looking forward to share my secrets with a big audience.

After 3 months of hard work, the do-it-yourself, step-by-step, SEO system for travel, tourism and hospitality companies is available!

You really need to read and implement the tasks listed in the checklists, manuals, templates and additional audio to get those high rankings that your competitors will be jealous of.

Here are the top 8 reasons to buy it today:

1. Reveals everything (EVERYTHING!) I learned in 4 years of massive research
2. Creates top 10 rankings in search engines on many quality keywords
3. SEO-consultants will cost more per hour
4. Focuses on 10% of the work that produces 90% of the results
5. Lets you cut costs on advertising
6. After using this system you will never need a SEO expert anymore
7. Easy for beginners, but still amazes experts
8. Studies show that the travel & tourism industry is ranking poor in search engines. Leaving opportunities for you!

Sounds interesting?

I suggest you read more about it at the product’s page, click to read.

Do you work for a hotel or resort and want to set the best foundation for your SEO efforts? Follow these steps!

In each hotel marketing plan there is a chapter for SEO nowadays. Which is good news. But do hotels know how to set the right foundation for SEO? Only then can amazing results be achieved.

Let’s walk through this step-by-step summary of everything you can do to make sure your SEO efforts can take off.

#1 Creative Keyword Research

Doing high-quality keyword research is the first part of successful SEO. We all know this. But how do you really spot opportunities? Here are some tips:

• Use the Google Keyword Tool.
• Do not focus a lot on competitive keywords with high search volume. Everybody is already optimizing for this.
• Search for keywords that have decent search volume (more than 500 per month) and where the Google AdWords competition bar (green) is not so full. Low competition in AdWords usually means low competition for SEO too.
• Try to find keywords such as “best time to visit X”, “things to do in X”, where “X” is a city or country.

#2 Have a SEO-Friendly Website

How can some webdesigners still build websites in frames, javascript/AJAX or flash (without HTML version added)? You might not have a clue what this is about, as it is very technical and/or geeky. I was discussing some website techniques that work against you. Your webdesigner knows about this!

Have a look at the following:

• A SEO-friendly website consists out of plain and clean HTML. Discuss it with your webdesigner.
• Build your website in Wordpress or add Wordpress for a blog. Best thing you can do!
• Add a sitemap to Google Webmaster Tools. If you use Wordpress install the plugin “XML-Sitemap” so it will be updated automatically for each new page you add in Wordpress. Otherwise, use www.xml-sitemaps.com to create static sitemaps.

#3 Use Keywords in Informative Articles & Webpages

After you have done in-depth research on your keywords, create pages around them. For example, for me an important keyword to get high rankings on is “hotel marketing” and “travel seo”. Look at this website and see where these words appear.

I know this is very basic SEO, but I also want this post to be valuable for beginners.

Add your keywords to:

• <title>
• <meta name=description>
• <h1>
• body text

If you use Wordpress this will happen automatically. Download and install Wordpress! It’s free. Also install the plugins “All in One SEO”, “SEO Smart Links” and “Link Juice Keeper”.

#4 Quality Link Building

If you write quality content and promote it you will get linked automatically. Promote your blog and informative articles by using Facebook, Twitter, guestblogging, forums, social networks (ning.com) and blog commenting (not just for link building but for talking to people who can start linking to you if you build a relationship with them).

Before you automatically get linked you need to start with some basic link building methods. Use my methods in the following posts to do quality link building:

• Quick Start Guide for Travel Link building
• Travel Link building with Google Search

Go! Go! Go!

Have questions? Ask for free and fast advice in the comments!

Do my SEO tips really work? Am I talking bull?

As you know by know, I am in the process of creating a SEO system for travel, tourism & hospitality websites that will ensure high rankings in Google (and also Yahoo and MSN if you care about it, I don’t!). I am very happy to announce that it is finished!

Finished? Already?

Well, not really. Having 10 years experience in online marketing doesn’t mean your system will actually work 100% if you just write about for 2 months. It needs to be tested!

Testing..

That’s exactly what I am doing right now. I am making sure that the system is friendly for people who have no idea about Search Engine Optimization. And, on the other hand, I am testing if a brand-new website will get high scores in Google on the keywords I have chosen. Within 3 months!

I built the website and am now adding some content that I bought from offshore writers for almost no money.

Follow me in this process to make sure that I am going to sell you a worthy product. I will only release SEO Secrets for Travel, Tourism & Hospitality after I’ve got proof it works with amazing results! Here is the website I just registered and created 1 day ago:

www.PhuketHotelsHoliday.com

Yes, I am going to try to get high rankings for keywords regarding Phuket, Thailand. I will try to accomplish about 20 top-10-rankings for my 40 keywords within 3 months!

Let me keep you up-to-date. I promise I will not write too many blogs about this, as it’s boring and you have no reason to be reading it. Let me get back to you with SEO tips that can help you. Soon!

Getting started with linkbuilding for travel websites can be tough. Many people’s  first thoughts are “Where do I start and how should I do it?”. Let me answer that question for you.

#1 Submit your website to travel directories

Go to the following websites and submit your travel site:

• www.dmoz.org/Recreation/Travel
• www.hoteldirectory.ws
• www.wizz.travel

#2 Submit your website to forums

Visite these forums and post some threads and replies related to your keywords. Use your keywords to link to your website. These forums hand you the ability to link your text in the textbox.

• travel.latimes.com/message-boards/index.php
• www.aardvarktravel.net/chat
• www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/index.jspa

#3 Submit your website to social networks

Ning.com makes it possible for you to submit your own content and create your own profile with links to your website. Just like with forums, you can decide which text will actually link to your website.

• htnetwork.ning.com
• socialnetwork.agentsky.net
• www.travelblogexchange.com

#4 Submit your website to blogs in the comments

You can comment on travel blogs related to your keywords. I will not list any websites here, but I will tell you how to find them. We are going to use Google for this.

Use the search query in Google and change YOUR_KEYWORD to your city or country. Open the search query in Google. Then comment at the bottom of the pages. Comment on at least 5-10 related blogs.

#5 Answer related questions on Q&A sites

Go to the following websites, search for people asking questions related to your city or country and answer them with good information.

• www.blurtit.com
• www.help.com
• www.yedda.com

Want to find more of these websites? Read the previous post Travel Linkbuilding with Google Search.

Are you up for finding some great tips that will get you started with quality linkbuilding? Let’s get started!

If you follow my tips on Twitter regularly, you might have seen some of my Google search queries. They give you access to websites that are related to your keywords. And of course, they are all dofollow (meaning: search engines will “see” the links and are thus not blocked by webmasters).

Here are my most powerful search queries to find websites to post your links to, related to your keywords.

After clicking the links, make sure you change “YOUR_KEYWORD” in the Google search bar! Change it to your destination or country.

Find dofollow blogs

Average impact
Fast turnaround time

KeywordLuv enabled blogs
HTML allowed in comments (not always dofollow)

Find dofollow classifieds

Small impact
Average turnaround time

Using Noah classifieds software

Find dofollow forums

Average impact
Average turnaround time

PHP BB powered forums

Find link directories (not always dofollow)

Average impact
Fast turnaround time

Add URL + Your Keyword

Find dofollow social networks

High impact
Average turnaround time

Ning.com social networks

Dofollow?

Want to find out if websites enable dofollow? Install SeoQuake for Mozilla Firefox. Edit the settings to set a strikethrough on nofollow.

Do you know some more interesting search queries?