Weekly SEO news: 6 October 2009
Welcome to the latest issue of the Search Engine Facts newsletter.

This week, we're taking a look at our top 10 ranking guarantee on Google. Is it really possible to guarantee a top 10 position on Google? What's the catch?

In the news: Google announces a canonical tag with cross-domain support, Bing's growth slows down, Google might have geo-targeting problems and more.

Table of contents:

We hope that you enjoy this newsletter and that it helps you to get more out of your website. Please pass this newsletter on to your friends.

Best regards,
Andre Voget, Johannes Selbach, Axandra CEO
1. What's the catch? How IBP's Google ranking guarantee works.

You have probably seen the top 10 ranking guarantee that we give users of our website promotion tool IBP: we guarantee that your website will be found in the regular (unpaid) search results on Google for the keywords of your choice.

Google

How can we guarantee top 10 rankings on Google and what's the catch?

Many people will tell you that it is not possible to guarantee top 10 rankings on Google. That is correct. No one can guarantee top 10 rankings except for Google's engineers.

However, IBP has a success rate of more than 98% and we will give you your money back if you belong to the very few people who don't get top 10 rankings on Google with IBP.

How does it work in detail?

1. You choose the keyword and the search engine

You tell IBP for which keyword you want to get a top 10 position and you choose the search engine on which you want to have a top 10 position. This can be Google.com, Google.co.uk, many other local Google variations as well as Yahoo, Bing, their local variations and many other search engines.

2. IBP analyzes your web page

IBP's Top 10 Optimizer will then analyze all the relevant ranking elements on your web page as well as the links to your website and calculate a ranking score based on that information. The higher the ranking score, the more likely it is that your website will be listed on Google's first result page.

3. IBP tells you in detail what you have to change

If your website does not have a 100% score, IBP will tell you in plain English what exactly you have to do to improve your web page and the links to your site. The advice will be tailored to your website, the chosen search engine and the chosen keyword and IBP will tell you in detail what you have to change and how you have to change it.

4. You make the changes on your web page

In the last step, you change your web page according to the suggestions of IBP's Top 10 Optimizer until there are no further suggestions (IBP's Top 10 Optimizer gives your site a 100% rating).

That's it. No catch, no strings attached. If you change your website according to IBP's Top 10 Optimizer then your website will be listed on Google's first result page in the regular results.

Other top 10 guarantees that you should stay away from

There are quite a few companies that offer top 10 guarantees. You should take a close look at their offerings. For example, some companies will charge you a monthly fee for the "optimization", take half of that fee to advertise your website on Google AdWords and that's it.

Other companies will give you a top 10 ranking guarantee, but only for keywords that they choose. It's not difficult to get top 10 rankings for obscure keywords that nobody searches for. Unfortunately, these top 10 rankings won't help your business at all.

A top 10 ranking guarantee should be for the keywords of your choice and it should be for the regular, unpaid search results. That's the guarantee that you get with IBP.

You can order IBP here. A demo version is available on this page.

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2. Search engine news and articles of the week

GoogleCanonical tag 2.0: Google to add cross domain support

"Many site owners have wanted the recently introduced canonical tag to work across domains. Now their wishes will come true. Google announced cross-domain support will come by the end of the year. The news came out during the Duplicate Content: The Search Engines Edition session at SMX East conference."



 Google might have difficulties with geo-targeting some websites (discussion)

"I've been told by my sites users that the above domain is now not listing well in Google.co.uk - but it is under Google.com, and even better under Google.fr - I get the feeling that Google thinks we are based in France, (we do have an office there), but our domain is hosted in the UK, and the settings in webmaster tools is also set to United Kingdom."



BingBing records first monthly decline since launch

"StatCounter Global Stats finds that Bing's share of the US search market in September fell by over one percentage point to 8.51% from 9.64% in August. There was little consolation for Microsoft from the performance of its new partner, Yahoo! which also declined, to 9.40% from 10.50%."



Google testing new ad unit for Places pages

"We've found a number of Google Places advertisements appearing on searches for 'Brand + Product Category' and include a link to a competitive local retailer. The advertisements represent an entirely new AdWords unit that we hadn't seen before and seem to be designed specifically for Google Places."



 Bug by bug, Google fixes a new idea

"Google seems to spit out interesting new technologies so easily, they could be made on an assembly line. When Ms. VanDyke and her cohorts allowed a reporter to sit in on their meetings, though, Google’s development process appeared a little more haphazard. [...]

The result: Google makes a better-looking text ad, advertisers can send ads only to high-end phones, and publishers (and Google) potentially get more money for ads, since high-end users can be more valuable."



Search engine newslets

  • Google announces full AdSense ads for mobile phones.
  • Google paid listings now appear in iPhone maps.
  • YouTube Promoted Videos to appear on AdSense sites.
  • Ask the Boss: Eric Schmidt, chairman and chief executive of Google.
  • Can Google stay on top of the web?
  • Schmidt: Google-Apple board member should stay put.
  • Google's co-founder might not be very polite.

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3. Success stories

"IBP makes it so much easier."

"Prior to being hired full-time as an employee here at Houser Shoes, Inc. early this summer, I was an independent SEO Specialist with 12 years experience and ran my own business. I used IBP then and knew of its value and capabilities.

The online shoe store is quite different from what I was used to with hundreds of vendors and thousands of products, each needing to rank for its own merit. This was going to be a test for IBP Business Edition (we're on version 11.6.2). The company had used 3rd party SEO services in the years preceding my arrival, but never really got where they should have.

My job was to recreate the foundation where others had missed, selecting the right keyword phrases. So I began the daunting task of entering project after project, each with its own unique focus and content. I baselined the rankings to show upper management the 'where we are now' and set up reports to run on auto. The methodologies outlined in IBP are pretty much the same as I had practiced for years prior to first purchasing the software. The difference is, IBP makes it so much easier.

Well, before long we were ranking (and still are) for many of the hundreds of keyword phrases that I had targeted, a pretty even split of top3, middle of page, and bottom of page 1. But the results are what it is all about. More traffic, increased sales, increased market share and happy faces. I haven't slowed down because of the shear volume of products we have on hand. However, I feel much easier about being able to manage the vast number of projects because I know that IBP is up to the task."
Doug Kelly, www.housershoes.com

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Let us know how IBP has helped you to improve your website and we might publish your success story with a link to your website in this newsletter. The more detailed your story is, the better.

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