1st attempt at SEO - My 'done' checklist

[LittleWoodWorkshop]

Morning all!

Right, having started a new business I'm attempting to keep costs at a minimum and have done the web design/SEO myself.

I accept my website isn't perfect, but for a first attempt at design I'm not too disappointed.
Whilst I know a good online presence is important most of my marketing is offline and therefore I'll improve the website when I get enough cash in to be able to afford it. Same applies for SEO.

So, as a first attempt at SEO I have done the following:

- Listed with google, registered for analytics, webmaster and adwords and keep an eye on these
- Registered with Google Places (just waiting for confirmation to come in the post)
- Registered with Yelp! and Yell
- Started a brief blog on Wordpress
- Listed all my products on Pinterest
- Put a Live Chat module on my website (this has been invaluable!)
- Use of Social Media, Facebook/Twitter/Pinterest
- Listed with DMoz
- Listed with Yahoo! Categories
- Listed with Bing!
- Written a description on my homepage highlighted some key keywords
- Changed the category titles from "/categoryid=124987&productid=3432423" childrens-furniture/lego-table/
- Input the meta keywords in the admin panel

To do and not sure about (need guidance):

1) Meta tags?
2) Meta keywords in code?
3) Image Tags?

I need to look into these, I've been browsing for some SEO guides.

So, what else do you think I need to do?

 

[mariauc4]

Hey, Great, i actually think your start up list is pretty impressive.

Have you claimed your company name across all popular domains?

Meta tags and descriptions are important but your title tags are a HUGE must. do not miss these out.

Let me know if i can be of any further help. Good Luck!

 

[LittleWoodWorkshop]

Hi Maria,

Thanks for that

I haven't claimed my company name across all domains. What do you mean by Title Tags (this one has escaped me).

Thanks,

Dave

Hey, Great, i actually think your start up list is pretty impressive.

Have you claimed your company name across all popular domains?

Meta tags and descriptions are important but your title tags are a HUGE must. do not miss these out.

Let me know if i can be of any further help. Good Luck!

 

[Normansmith]

If you are happy then that's ok, but think about it from the visitors view ! Your title tags are in position, but have you done the keyword research to back up the selection you have made? assuming your are targeting organic searches and not using adwords or FB ads. Are people actually looking online for those terms ? or are you using the website as an online brochure to send people to from your off line marketing!

 

[MissoldInvestments]

title tags are the <h1> to <h6> tags that are the headers for different sections of your web page, so your "boots" page, top page title might be <h1> red boots </h1> then lower down on the page you might be talking about <h2> green boots </h2>

They are important as google uses them as one the signals, so making them the keywords within that page that you want to rank for is useful.

Im sure if im wrong on this someone will correct me

 

[OldWelshGuy]

Nah, the 'title tag' is the page title tag,

H1 etc are page heading tags

 

[JonathanSEO]

What do you mean by Title Tags (this one has escaped me).

Thanks,

Dave

Nah, the 'title tag' is the page title tag,

H1 etc are page heading tags

Yup, in your case Dave the title tag of your homepage is:

Personalised Toy Box | Personalised Lego Table | Shelving | Bespoke Furniture Design | Garden Furniture

Each page should have a unique title tag. Which your pages do I think at first glance.

I think your site is alright, may get some orders. I can spot a million and one changes but honestly it wouldn't be worth spelling them out. Just better to learn as you go on this one.

What I will say is though you is you have written all that text on the homepage for search engines, not for visitors. I don't need reminding you do lego tables 10 times. That is key real estate and you're not enticing me in with that type of copy.

Finally you say "Most of my marketing is offline and therefore I'll improve the website when I get enough cash in to be able to afford it. Same applies for SEO."

If that is the case and you're confident a website is the future for this business, then rather than spending 100's of hours working with Opencart to do an ok DIY job, you'd be better off investing that time into your proven offline marketing and ramping it up to generate enough cash reserves to afford getting a website done properly that's going to give you a professional image.

 

[fisicx]

I think your site is alright, may get some orders. I can spot a million and one changes but honestly it wouldn't be worth spelling them out.

The OP has already posted in the website review forum where many suggestions were made.

 

[JonathanSEO]

The OP has already posted in the website review forum where many suggestions were made.

Cool, I don't have access to that.

The last 2 sentences of my post were the most important ones though. Not the potential changes.

 

[FIZIX Agency]

A good start and definitely moving in the right direction. Just make sure you utilize the social media channels and blog correctly.

I'll add to the analytics; to look at heatmapping solutions as they can help a great deal when it comes to converting those visitors into buyers; highlighting the efficiency of your call to actions, what content is and is not being read, the pages hot and cold points etc; which you can use to guide changes to your visitor flow and UI design.

A particularly good solution is Reinvigorate ( http://www.reinvigorate.net ) which when used alongside Google Analytics is very useful.


Also, if you want to monitor your social media effectiveness, solutions like ChartBeat are useful. Although maybe not as important for your kind of company; depends how you intend to use social media really.

 

[LittleWoodWorkshop]

Yep I've had some valuable reviews of my website that I acted upon and it does look a lot better since then. Just looking at the SEO side of things now.
I did change the title of the page to include my keywords (a tip I picked up elsewhere).
I have seen suggestions around image tags if anyone could expand upon that for me

 

[fisicx]

For every image include a descriptive alt tag and a caption. Put the image alongside a description. Make sure the grouping has a relevant header. Give the image a useful filename.

Make sure links to the image group have relevant anchor-text.

So you could have:
alt: wooden table to lego storage
caption: oak lego storage table.
description: solid oak table with storage for lego and a 300mm base board....
Header: Oak Table with storage for lego
Filename: lego-storage-table.jpg
Anchor Text: lego storage table

And so on.

 

[LittleWoodWorkshop]

Cheers Fisicx,

Ill look into how this is done with Opencart tonight. Hopefully I don't have to dive into coding

 

[LittleWoodWorkshop]

For every image include a descriptive alt tag and a caption. Put the image alongside a description. Make sure the grouping has a relevant header. Give the image a useful filename.

Make sure links to the image group have relevant anchor-text.

So you could have:
alt: wooden table to lego storage
caption: oak lego storage table.
description: solid oak table with storage for lego and a 300mm base board....
Header: Oak Table with storage for lego
Filename: lego-storage-table.jpg
Anchor Text: lego storage table

And so on.

Just done a bit of research and it appears as though this is done by default, unless of course you found something missing?

I've just done a Google search for "personalised double toy box" (I did it on my phone as well which hasn't been used for my website as much) and the first hit and the first image was mine.

I also made a typo and did a search for "personalised double toy boy", I need to clear my internet history now

Regards,

(Soon to be divorced) Dave

 

[tommytx]

Hi Maria,
Thanks for that
I haven't claimed my company name across all domains. What do you mean by Title Tags (this one has escaped me).
Thanks,
Dave

Can someone explain what that means.. claim my site across all domains... I know how to claim my site via technoratti.com but not sure what is meant by across all domains....

 

[Janelle]

To do and not sure about (need guidance):

1) Meta tags?
2) Meta keywords in code?
3) Image Tags?

I need to look into these, I've been browsing for some SEO guides.

So, what else do you think I need to do?

Please Please! Don't forget the Meta tag! Especially the TITLE and DESC. Based on my experience, my rankings are doing well because of the help of meta tag (in-terms of On-page).

 

[LittleWoodWorkshop]

Please Please! Don't forget the Meta tag! Especially the TITLE and DESC. Based on my experience, my rankings are doing well because of the help of meta tag (in-terms of On-page).

Thanks Janella,

I've gone into 'Page Source' and the following is listed:

<meta name="description" content="Personalised Toy Box" /> <meta name="keywords" content="Personalised Toy Box" />

Each page has it's equivelant "content" value. Is this what I'm looking for?

Thanks,

Dave

 

[fisicx]

The application picks up information from the database and fills in all the boxes.

What YOU need to do is override these settings. So like the images, you need to personalise everything. Change the defaults to something friendly using words that people might use to search for things.

'Personalised Toy Box' is a good start but the meta description should have up to 150 charcaters so you could have:

Personalised Toy Boxes made from recycled and sutainable wood. Each box is decorated with names, pictures and other features on request. Prices from £87 Call Dave on 0123456789 to find out more.

Do the same for everything on the site - don't let OC do it for you.

 

[LittleWoodWorkshop]

The application picks up information from the database and fills in all the boxes.

What YOU need to do is override these settings. So like the images, you need to personalise everything. Change the defaults to something friendly using words that people might use to search for things.

'Personalised Toy Box' is a good start but the meta description should have up to 150 charcaters so you could have:

Personalised Toy Boxes made from recycled and sutainable wood. Each box is decorated with names, pictures and other features on request. Prices from £87 Call Dave on 0123456789 to find out more.

Do the same for everything on the site - don't let OC do it for you.

So how would the search engine react to that? E.g. If I change 'Personalised Toy Box' to what you suggested would people have to search for

"Personalised Toy Boxes made from recycled and sutainable wood. Each box is decorated with names, pictures and other features on request. Prices from £87 Call Dave on 0123456789 to find out more."

to find my listing? Or will that be displayed in the search engine?

Thanks,

Dave

 

[fisicx]

When you do a search a snippet is displayed.

The page title is the bit in blue.
Beneath is an extract form the page contents or more often the meta description.

The meta description doesn't have a direct SEO benefit but it's prime marketing material and can generate clicks. If the words are in the meta description and on the page then google will pick up on keyword matches. It doesn't have to match the whole thing. Look at search results and you will see some of the words emboldened. It's google indicating where they found a match.

If you just have the 'persnalised toy box' everywhere youi are losing out on loads of potential keywords. People could be searching for: wooden toy boxes, painted toy boxes, toy boxes with child name, boxes for toys with a lid...

There are so many opportunities to expand you business outside the narrow field you a targeting. And it's why OC isn't the right platform for you. You offer a personal service. The looks like a factory.

 

[LittleWoodWorkshop]

When you do a search a snippet is displayed.

The page title is the bit in blue.
Beneath is an extract form the page contents or more often the meta description.

The meta description doesn't have a direct SEO benefit but it's prime marketing material and can generate clicks.

If you just have the 'persnalised toy box' everywhere youi are losing out on loads of potential keywords. People could be searching for: wooden toy boxes, painted toy boxes, toy boxes with child name, boxes for toys with a lid...

There are so many opportunities to expand you business outside the narrow field you a targeting. And it's why OC isn't the right platform for you. You offer a personal service. The looks like a factory.

Thanks a lot, I'll get on to this

 

[mariauc4]

Hi Maria,

Thanks for that

I haven't claimed my company name across all domains. What do you mean by Title Tags (this one has escaped me).

Thanks,

Dave

Sorry for the late response Dave, everyone seems to have answered it for you. Each title needs to be unique to the page otherwise the search bots will get confused. if you have given all pages one title yet they all offer different things; how will the bots know? it is effectively rather simple in that sense; just describe your page- that is what SEO is, ensuring that the search engines can find your site and rank it accordingly.

 

[mariauc4]

Can someone explain what that means.. claim my site across all domains... I know how to claim my site via technoratti.com but not sure what is meant by across all domains....

Sorry for the late response. What i mean is the below sites- social signals etc are taken into account and titles and headings are important, you want to ensure that you are maximising on your business potential by controlling how and where your name appears...you dont want someone to search for your company and someone else, with the same name appears. I hope that makes sense.

• Twitter
• Facebook
• Yelp
• Youtube
• Linkedin
• Wordpress
• Tumblr
• Pinterest
• Hulu
• Technorati
• About.me
• Posterous
• Typepad
• Squidoo
• Stumblesupon
• Etsy
• Gravatar
• Scribd
• Livejournal
• Hubpages
• Flickr
• Photobucket

 

[RyanJ]

Don't worry about meta keywords as they're completely ignored.

 

[adsengine]

Make sure you fill in your privacy and terms and conditions / returns policy, search engines like to see that your a trustworthy retailer. you have a phone number on the homepage but is part of an image make this clickable, it shows the engines that your a real contactable person. Your title should use the h1 tag something like "little wood workshop - custom toy boxes and lego tables" do a little keyword research see what the most popular search terms are pertaining to your business. Also consider which items are the most profitable what would make you the most profit, one lego table or dozen name plates.

One final thought would be to remember that even if your site ranks number one for the items you sell, you have a very short amount of time to "get that sale". If the visitor doesn't like what they see they will be off to the next site on the list.

Most people spend far too much time worrying about seo and forget marketing side of things. Your website is your shop window, will the visitor come in for a look around or go next door instead.

atb

Dave

atb

Dave