A snowy Sunday morning here in the coal region. A good day to be inside and where I plan to spend the rest of my day watching some football this afternoon.

Before that though I have to deal with the white crap and finish up this post. For those that are not familiar with the Sunday Goodies, they are 3 blog posts I found in my travels through the blogosphere that I would like to highlight for you, my reader.

This week there are 2 on SEO and one on guest blogging.

Will start with Tristan at Blogging Bookshelf and his post titled “4 Ways to Show off the Guest Posts You’ve Written”. Has some great ways to promote your guest posts and that is a win win for both you and the blogger who welcomed you as a guest.

The second stop this week is on a topic mostly overlooked that can make a difference in how Google counts your links. It is from Chris Burns at Search Engine Optimization X and titled “How To Make Site Canonical Friendly”.

Now before your eyes glaze over and you start wondering what has happened to the nut that runs this blog the key is to make sure that all your links go to either http://MYBLOG.COM or http://www.MYBLOG.COM and not both.

Last but not least by any means is a post from an old time friend Pat Marcello over at The SEO News Blog and her article titled “Google Rumor Could Make Your Title Tag Even More Important“.

Title tags are a topic I have ranted on more than once and it looks like they may become even more important to Google than they are already.

That’s it for this week and your input is always appreciated. Take a few minutes and check out each of these and apply some of the tips that will help you.

About the author

Mike Paetzold got started blogging in 2003 and has become an expert on using WordPress. He has become known as The WordPress Guy. After being an under ground niche marketer using his blogs he has surfaced to share some of the ways he uses blogs to enter various niches profitably. If you would like help in building your business check out my coaching offer.

Technorati Tags: blogging, blogosphere, chris burns, google, guest posting, marcello, search engine optimization, seo, title tags

The short answer is yes you should and no they are different.

Confusion about the difference between filling in your keywords in All In One SEO and adding tags is quite common from some of the questions I get.

When you add your keywords into All In One SEO it creates the appropriate keyword meta tag in the header of that post’s page.

There is a lot of debate as to how much weight the various search engines give to this meta tag anymore. I’ll leave that debate to the people who specialize in those types of things.

I will say it does not seem to hurt unless you are keyword stuffing there. That can be a detriment but no one but the search engines can say for sure whether it helps or hurts and they just don’t tell you.

Now tags are different. They actually create an archive page on your blog for each separate tag. The search engines will index this content if they can find them.

It adds additional content to your blog. It is important that your theme or your plugins will create links that the spiders can find and follow.

The new Twenty Ten theme adds them automatically for you but not all themes do. If they don’t you may want to add a plugin that will help with that or set up a tag cloud in your side bar.

I have seen posts get listed in Google with a double listing from tags. One for the post and one for the tag page.

Hope that helps you understand the difference between tags and keywords. Although very similar, they are different and help in different ways.

Technorati Tags: archive page, blog, google, keyword, keyword meta tag, seo, tags

Blog 3 Pack will be disappearing Sunday morning.

There are 3 things that you must get right to make money with blogging.

• Keyword research
• SEO of your blog
• Monetization methods

All three of those topics were covered in detail in three one hour plus calls complete with transcripts and workbooks.

Each package sells for $27. With the 3 pack you can get all 3 for $37 and save almost 55% over the normal price.

This offer ends Sunday morning so check it out today at

Blog 3 Pack Special

About the author

Mike Paetzold got started blogging in 2003 and has become an expert on using WordPress. He has become known as The WordPress Guy. After being an under ground niche marketer using his blogs he has surfaced to share some of the ways he uses blogs to enter various niches profitably. If you would like help in building your business check out my coaching offer.

Technorati Tags: keyword-research, monetization, seo, special offer, transcripts

Getting the proper plugins structure can make a big difference in how well your blog works. The list below are the ones I recommend.

Now some of that is personal choice as WordPress has a huge number of plugins available and there are other plugins that will do the same or similar things. If you look to change your title tags, create a sitemap or control your pinging there are multiple choices available.

This list has worked well for me and do not conflict with the other plugins and themes I use regularly. All of these plugins are in the WordPress codex and can be installed directly into your blog.

All In One SEO – Having the ability to create custom title tags is a must have for your SEO efforts. Being able to do this can make a huge difference in how your post ranks in the various search engines.

Simple Tags – Taking advantage of proper tagging can make a huge difference in your rankings and internal linking. This plugin allows you to add related posts to improve the amount of time people spend on your site. If you use a different tagging plugin you would then need a related post plugin.

WP To Technorati – Technorati is a huge blog search engine and taking advantage of the potential traffic there is a smart move.

Google XML Sitemap – Having a properly formatted sitemap makes it easier for the search engines to spider your site. Regardless of the plugin you use for creating a sitemap make sure that you are submitting it and verifying it in Google Webmaster Tools.

Ultimate Plugins Smart Update Pinger – WordPress has a flaw in that it will ping each tie you edit and if you are like me and sometimes make a mistake and despite editing the post first still find other mistakes later this is a must have. Limiting the pinging will keep you from being looked at as a spammer from the directories.

These are the 5 SEO plugins I see as a must have. The key is to have your blog set up to do what these do. Now if you are using different ones but are covering the topics there is no need to change.

There are lots of choices available with the number of plugins and fining the ones that will do this and not conflict is the key.

These are my choices. What are yours?

Your questions and comments are always welcomed. Just leave them below.

About the author

Mike Paetzold got started blogging in 2003 and has become an expert on using WordPress. He has become known as The WordPress Guy. After being an under ground niche marketer using his blogs he has surfaced to share some of the ways he uses blogs to enter various niches profitably. If you would like help in building your business check out my coaching offer.

Technorati Tags: blog, codex, google, Google webmaster tools, search-engine, seo, technorati, title tags, traffic, various search engines, wordpress

If you are like me you are always looking for more ways to get more traffic to your posts and a higher ranking in the search engines is one of the best ways. These 3 tips will help you do just that.

Start using them regularly in your blogging and they will help you get more visitors. They do take time and continuous usage to really kick start your traffic.

• Focused content
• Using tags
• Getting backlinks

Lets go into more detail on each of these.

Focused Content

This starts with proper keyword research. You can rank for any term if you are willing to put in the effort but some are easier than others. I prefer to go for low hanging fruit first. These are terms that have a reasonable amount of searches but not overwhelming competition.

You can get a free trial of Market Samurai along with some great training videos that will show you how to find these topics. Once you have a topic focus on that. Keep your post to a single topic and you will be more likely to rank for that and the higher you rank the more potential traffic you will get.

Use all the tags

Make sure that you are using a title tag on your blog post. The default in WordPress is your blog title so unless your theme changes that make sure you are using a plugin like All In One SEO to customize your title tag.

Make sure you are using the header tags for your keyword you are looking to rank for in your post where it is appropriate as that too will help the spiders decide what your post is about.

Finally make sure you are using your keyword in the alt tag in any images you use in your post.

Backlinks

Get or create back links to your post. This can be done in a variety of ways. Commenting on related blogs that use Comment Luv is one of the easiest ways.

You can use the various parasite hosts (Squidoo, Hub Pages, et al) to create anchor links with your keyword in them to your post.

Article marketing is another way to create back links to your post. For more ways to create back links check out Backlink Flood.

Using these 3 tips regularly will allow you to generate more traffic from the search engines to your blog. After that the key is to convert that traffic into something useful but that is a topic for another day.

About the author

Mike Paetzold got started blogging in 2003 and has become an expert on using WordPress. He has become known as The WordPress Guy. After being an under ground niche marketer using his blogs he has surfaced to share some of the ways he uses blogs to enter various niches profitably. If you would like help in building your business check out my coaching offer.

Technorati Tags: backlinks, blog title, blog traffic, blogging, header tags, keyword-research, low hanging fruit, search engines, seo, title tag, topic focus

I have been discussing comments for the last few posts and today lets talk about finding blogs to comment on.

Now there are lists and various posts showing you exactly which blogs are do follow and some people swear by those. If all you are looking for is back links maybe that makes sense but not to me.

Worrying about the do follow or whether or not they use Comment Luv may make you better for SEO purposes but I prefer to find blogs that are on my topic.

Those blogs are much more likely to have people clicking through to my blogs and possibly becoming regular readers.

So even though I would prefer to only comment on blogs that do follow and use Comment Luv the topic is more important.

To do this I go to Google News. Put in my topic and add the rss feed to my Google Reader. This way I see all the newest information on my topic. I can use this to find very current posts on topics I am interested in.

As I find blogs that show up regularly and frequently I add their feed to my reader. Just checking my reader a few times a day and I can find all of their newest posts and go comment.

The closer you are to being the first comment the more people that will see your comment. The more that see it the more traffic you are likely to get.

This is also a good way to find information to share with your Twitter followers too and if you add in Friend Feed you can automate your Twitter posting to build an even better relationship with your Twitter followers.

Twitter Time Saver will show you exactly how to automate that into an easy to use system.

About the author

Mike Paetzold got started blogging in 2003 and has become an expert on using WordPress. He has become known as The WordPress Guy. After being an under ground niche marketer using his blogs he has surfaced to share some of the ways he uses blogs to enter various niches profitably. If you would like help in building your business check out my coaching offer.

Technorati Tags: blog, blog comments, Google News, Google Reader, rss feed, seo, twitter

Just released the recordings and transcripts from last weeks call on WordPress SEO. It is available at WordPress SEO Call.

Here is what was covered

* What plugins are absolutely necessary?
* What settings make a difference?
* What types of posts will help me the most?
* How often should I post?
* What are tags and how do they help?
* What linking strategies work the best?
* Why is MyBlogLog a must use site?
* How can RSS feeds help my SEO?
* And even more including all the questions attendees had

Get your copy today at

WordPress SEO

About the author

Mike Paetzold got started blogging in 2003 and has become an expert on using WordPress. He has become known as The WordPress Guy. After being an under ground niche marketer using his blogs he has surfaced to share some of the ways he uses blogs to enter various niches profitably. If you would like help in building your business check out my coaching offer.

Technorati Tags: seo, wordpress, wordpress seo, WordPress SEO Call

Tomorrow at 7 pm Steve Roye and I will be holding our free WordPress SEO Call. You need to register to attend.

WordPress SEO Call

You can grab the note sheet if you want to see all that we will be covering.

Note sheet

In addition to the note sheet all attendees will receive a pdf with all of the links mentioned, how to’s with screen captures so you can apply these items right away.

Best of all we will continue until we have answered all of your questions.

You must be registered to get the call details so go sign up right now.

WordPress SEO Call

Hope to see you there.

About the author

Mike Paetzold got started blogging in 2003 and has become an expert on using WordPress. He has become known as The WordPress Guy. After being an under ground niche marketer using his blogs he has surfaced to share some of the ways he uses blogs to enter various niches profitably. If you would like help in building your business check out my coaching offer.

Technorati Tags: seo, wordpress, wordpress seo, WordPress SEO Call

One of the biggest questions that comes up here is how to generate more traffic to someone’s blog? To help people with that Steve and I will be doing a call on SEO For Your WordPress Blog. Proper set up and SEO are one of the best ways to increase your traffic.

We will answer these questions -

• What plugins are absolutely necessary?
• What settings make a difference?
• What types of posts will help me the most?
• How often should I post?
• What are tags and how do they help?
• What linking strategies work the best?
• Why is MyBlogLog a must use site?
• How can RSS feeds help my SEO?
• And even more because you will be able to ask any question you have on this topic too?

You can get access to this call for free on September 23rd at 7 pm.

Sign up here.

About the author

Mike Paetzold got started blogging in 2003 and has become an expert on using WordPress. He has become known as The WordPress Guy. After being an under ground niche marketer using his blogs he has surfaced to share some of the ways he uses blogs to enter various niches profitably. If you would like help in building your business check out my coaching offer.

Technorati Tags: blog seo, seo, wordpress seo

3 Easy Tips To Improve Your WordPress Blog

Copyright 2009 – Mike Paetzold – All worldwide rights reserved

Here are 3 easy ways to improve your WordPress blog and get better search engine rankings for your blog.

There is no doubt that the Big G likes blogs and one of the reasons so many people have switched from static websites to blogs. The interlinking inside of the blog is a great help but there is one thing that has not been addressed even in the latest version of WordPress.

Talk to anyone that does seo and invariably they will all agree that your title tag is the most important part of your on site optimization. (And getting any three seo experts to agree on anything is rare.)

Unfortunately, WordPress by default uses your blog title as the title tag across the board.

So the first easy change is…

Add a plugin to change the title tags. This way each page will use the post title as the title tag and you even can use a custom title tag.

The plugin I currently use for this is the All In One SEO plugin but there are many others. One of the things with WordPress is the constant influx of new plugins so this might change in the future as it has in the past more than once.

The second easy change is…

Your images. Make sure when you add images you are using the alt tags and naming your images with keywords. Since the advent of uiniversal search Google is often showing images in the main results. Not likely to get a click on image12896.jpg but if your image was named keyword.jpg it would be more likely.

The header image is a prime example. Most themes call the header image header.jpg or header.gif or something similar. Why not rename it to one of your prime keywords?

**Caveat – You will need to change it in your css file too or it will disappear and you won’t have a header. Just search your css file for the name of your header and change it each time you find it.

The third easy change is….

Use the built in tagging structure in WordPress. Either display the tags with each post or use a tag cloud in your sidebar or footer. This creates new tag pages on your site and will often result in indented rankings for that topic in Google.

This gives you two listings for the same post inside the search engines.

Now I do like to use the Simple Tags plugin as it allows me more functionality than the native tagging inside WordPress. Again though plugin recommendations are always subject to change because of the fluid nature of their development. The key is that you use a plugin when it will improve the functionality and take the time to tag each of your posts.

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About the author – Mike Paetzold is known as an expert on using WordPress for your marketing solutions. For more tips check out his report “7 Tips To Make Your WordPress Blog Search Engine Friendly” or follow his blog at WordPress Made Easy.
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You may use and reprint this article as long as it is posted in it’s entirety and all links and the resource box are included. If you are an affiliate for the book you may substitute your affiliate link for mine.

Technorati Tags: alt tags, search engines. plugin, seo, simple tags, tag, tag cloud, WordPess