Hi Guys Noob Alert

[davie_zone]

Hi Guys

Very new to this, have had a good read around here first. I have a plumbing business that I want to get at the top so its alittle different to what most of you are doing but my keywords are pretty uncompetitive to start off .

I havent even done any seo so was going to start off with powersuite seo . Then thinking of using senuke to drive up my page.

My question is are these considered black hat ? Should I make a second page with a slightly different adress in case.

Thanks In Advance

Any tips info welcome
Any comprehensive guides out there you could point me at ?

 

[redrubies]

I personally don't think you need much of anything to get a plumbing business to number 1. You can do that on your own. Make a good title, good keywords on your pages, good h1, 2, and 3 headings, good description. Put yourself in google places. A couple of pages of free stuff would make you stand apart from the rest. Maybe a couple of pages of freebies like "How to caulk properly" with pictures and instructions. Do a couple of free link blasts. I like this one for sites that I just finished making. http://www.imtalk.org/cmps_index.php?pageid=IMT-Website-Submitter Do a youtube video. A how to plumbing video is excellent. Get a facebook page and a twitter page. I really think that's all you'll need to get to the top for keywords like "plumber in chicago, il" without the quotes.

 

[netmoney1]

Welcome and good luck! There is a lot of VERY good information here! Also, some good service providers that could help get your site on top. Check out the Services For Sale section and read reviews, ask questions and soak it all in. Good luck with your business

 

[Deleted member 120847]

As above, I acheived this for a plumber client a couple of years back with near exact tchnique as above.

Think the only automation I used was scrapebox though, everything else was real content.

 

[davie_zone]

Hi
Thanks for your reply. I used to have a large site with lots of pages etc and got some traffic but nothing ever converted.

I have since broke my site up into micro niche sites of my business. So a sepertate one just for boiler installs , one for boiler servicing. These pages are specific to the keywords and are very call to action orientated. I have been trialing them via google adwords and am now at the point where some of them are doing very well in converting certain keywords. I would now like this to be free though obviously.

But they are pretty small landing pages with just one page each. Because I have split it in this way making facebook and twitter accounts for each may be difficult .

Would senuke work as I had planned , are you suggesting this is overkill or just not the right way to do it ?

Thanks Again for your help

 

[redrubies]

Hi
Thanks for your reply. I used to have a large site with lots of pages etc and got some traffic but nothing ever converted.

I have since broke my site up into micro niche sites of my business. So a sepertate one just for boiler installs , one for boiler servicing. These pages are specific to the keywords and are very call to action orientated. I have been trialing them via google adwords and am now at the point where some of them are doing very well in converting certain keywords. I would now like this to be free though obviously.

But they are pretty small landing pages with just one page each. Because I have split it in this way making facebook and twitter accounts for each may be difficult .

Would senuke work as I had planned , are you suggesting this is overkill or just not the right way to do it ?

Thanks Again for your help

I don't see the need to break up a plumbing site. It's just a basic local site and is no different from a listing in the yellow pages. People who are looking for a plumber in your area look you up and call you. It's very easy to get that to number 1. The conversion will depend on how many in your area need a plumber. I wouldn't hire you if I saw all different sites for you. It's too confusing. You should have one page explaining everything you do. Google must be wondering what on earth you are doing having all these sites just for a local plumber.

 

[davie_zone]

Yes but as I explained it wasnt gaining me any work the large site and people dont always type plumber if the want a gas fire fitted so , I have a seperate site containing one landing page which converts on keywords like gas fire fitter, gas fire installer . I have book a site visit now and tell them why they should hire us. No links to other parts of the site just a gentle persuasion to enter their details and ask for a quote. This is working for me BUT via adwords. If I could get each site up to the top naturally my profit margin on the jobs would soar. It would need to be top for say six keywords but again they arent diet , money making keywords, just stuff like boiler repair , gas engineer etc

hope this helps

 

[redrubies]

But you will get that with your basic site if you do everything properly. Take gas fire installer for instance. If that is one of the things you want to target, then you have your basic local site with your front page explaining each thing you do and use the h tags. One of the things on the list is gas fire installer. You link it. The link goes to a page yoursite.com/gas-fire-installer where you explain this a bit more in depth and include a picture. The picture also has tags. The page has it's own title and description. It's not necessary to have all these sites for each thing you do and in the long run it will do more harm than good. Not only will the google bot "see" all these sites for your one business, but it will confuse the heck out of customers.

 

[judson]

Just out of interest, why did you split them up? This just seems like overkill. And as you pointed out, you then suffer from the problem of linking to social media pages.

The main thing to focus on for your plumbing page, is big and very visible call to actions.

Have one site, with a really good landing page, aka homepage. Have small service boxes on there highlighting your main service areas. The inner pages can then have a page for each service area.

Use you header well. Have your contact number prominently displayed. Maybe throw in a mini contact form in your sidebar too.

Depending on the competition in your geographic area, it might then make sense to have inner pages for each Area+Service. Like County ABC plumbing, or County XYZ Boiler repair. You can build links to these in your footer.

Video is good. Video testimonials are better. Use Fiverr well.

You probably won't need much in the way of backlinking to get these pages ranked.

For a plumbing site, don't go overboard with content the esoterics of the plumbing business. Your customers are not going to be interested. If you have loads of content like that, use that on web 2.0 sites to build links to your money site.

Don't forget Google+ Places. That's where you want to rank well. And you will also want to have 5★ reviews there.

Remember, for the most part, you want to give your potential customers confidence that you are a competent individual, and that you can fix their problem.

Dazzling them with Wikipedia style knowledge is interesting, but unlikely to lead to higher conversions.

 

[davie_zone]

Hi

The reason I split it up is my site was so large people are only ever looking for a particular thing. People werent nesasarily landing in the right page and clicking off before finding it , or getting distracted by other things and then not giving me the leads.

If I could post links ( im not sure if this is allowed ) you would see what I mean.

I could use the new landing pages as sections of the new site easily but I would like to make sure they land on them for certain keywords, if this makes sense.

If someone types in bathroom fitter, I would like them to land on that landing page with no link back to the home page so they dont wander , but not sure if this is possible. I would maybe send them to the home page after they have entered their details.

How many keywords can you get a large site to rank for ?

Sorry for the confusion , but this has worked for me , allthough via adwords.

Thanks again for the advice I will take it all on board

 

[davie_zone]

Also to clarify , or even confuse you even further. These sites arent all called the same thing. Each has their own logo and name and are part of a larger parent company. So I have a bathroom team website, where it seems as though all we do is bathrooms and do them well, this sits well with customers and makes us look small but specialised. I then have a boiler team website with its own logo etc etc each with own domain names

 

[judson]

I understand.

If that works well, then stick with that. Particularly if you have separate branding and corporate identities. *that* makes sense.

I don't think there is a limit on the number of keywords that a site can rank for.

That said, you want to pick the low hanging fruit.

Run your keywords through the Google Keyword tool, and focus initially on those with significant searches every month. There can't be that many, per site.

Next step ... figure out where your site is ranking for those keywords, and then focus your SEO attention on that.

There is no need to blitzkrieg through 100 keywords. Do a few at a time, repeating what works, and discarding what doesn't.

Once again, don't forget social signals. Get your facebook pages and so forth sorted out. You would be amazed at the number of people who use these tools to get recommendations for a plumber from their friends/fans. And if you offer business services, then you want to be on LinkedIn too. With recommendations ... again, Fiverr can help.

 

[netmoney1]

Seems like you are going to create way more work for yourself this way....why not have 1 domain with sub pages...and rake each of those?

Ex:

xxxxx.com/bathroom-remodeling
xxxxx.com/pumbling-wideget-1
xxxxx.com/plumbing-widget-2
xxxxx.com/plumbing-widget-3
xxxxx.com/kitchen-sink

...and make each of those subpages unique...that way when they bounce on that page they will see its part of a large operating...bigger company...and you may even get more jobs out of it...they may say "oh hey they also do "x"...

etc, etc

 

[judson]

Sorry for the double post.

seopowersuite is great for doing the sort of research I outlined above ... where you are in the rankings for the keywords across various search engines. And you can also use it to get an indication of the amount of backlinking and so forth that your competitors have.

That will give you an indication of the amount of work you will need to put into improving your rankings.

I do worry that unleashing a tool like SENuke on your sites might be like trying to drink from a fire hydrant. Yes, you'll get some water in you, but you are liable to do more damage than good.

 

[StressKills]

Sorry for the double post.

seopowersuite is great for doing the sort of research I outlined above ... where you are in the rankings for the keywords across various search engines. And you can also use it to get an indication of the amount of backlinking and so forth that your competitors have.

That will give you an indication of the amount of work you will need to put into improving your rankings.

I do worry that unleashing a tool like SENuke on your sites might be like trying to drink from a fire hydrant. Yes, you'll get some water in you, but you are liable to do more damage than good.

I also have a local business and I totally agree. Seo Powersuite was useful and easy to use.

 

[judson]

Oh yeah, forgot to add.

A working version of SEOPowerSuite is available in the download section, so you can try before you buy ;-)

 

[davie_zone]

Hi Guys

Thanks for the input. I know which keywords are getting good traffic and converting from my adwords. I will definatley use seopowersuite and try and improve my ranking via that. I get a lot of clicks through generic search terms like bathroom fitter. without a location. obviously with adwords I can narrow this down. My thought was senuke may help me get to the top for about ten generic keywords and then I can have a map on my site to filter out jobs that are to far away.

Do you still think this is no good. Sorry for the silly questions I know very little but a lot of my reading pointed towads this being one of the best things out there.

 

[judson]

Thanks for the input. I know which keywords are getting good traffic and converting from my adwords. .

The important question though, is 'what are your current SERPs positions for those keywords'?

Similarly, how competitive are they, or put another way, just how much back linking and so forth has been done by the folk in the first few spots for those words?

And at the risk of sounding contrite, I presume your on-site SEO for those keywords is done 100% right?

 

[davie_zone]

Hi
No I have done zero seo work except naming images , meta tags title of the page my keywords. All my experimentation has been via google adwords. Expensive but instant . Now I know what works and what doesnt what are the converting keywords this is what I would like to do.

I think I get it slightly . My plan was to use seo powersuite to advise me of the basics, then Im thinking from your post check out my competition backlink wise and beat them. Is it really that simple, or is there really that much emphasis on backlinks as this is all Im reading. What about backlink genie , the advertisers on here ? Is that an avenue for me ?

Sorry again , I think you should create an idiot guide sticky with the before basics lol for people like me.

Thank you all so much I really do appreiciate you taking the time to help

 

[judson]

I'm concerned that you seem to have a thing for tools. It is almost as if you feel like you should spend money on some tool so you can be a member of the big boys club

I used to be like that, till I learned to focus on what actually counts .... the bottom line.

Were you sites done using Wordpress? Via a few plugins, you can easily sort our the on-site SEO.

For the best results, you want to be systematic about the entire process.

Sort out your on-site SEO. Then investigate the competition. Only then, can you make an *informed* decision about the amount of effort that will be required to outrank them, and by extension, the tools or services you will need to outrank them.

Many of those tools you mention are not inexpensive, and you could jolly well end up spending hundreds or thousands on shiny kit you don't need.