A reader made a comment on a previous post and asked some great questions that I’m sure many of you have, so I thought I’d answer his questions in this post.  Bob wrote…

What do you think of the Bluehost deals for SEO? I just signed up for their $99/month service for one keyword. They will put a 4 page wordpress site up for me and start creating links to it. They do 3 keywords for $199.

I’m reading SEO for Dummies now and may get your ebook as well. Am I better off writing my own keyword-rich content (or hiring freelancers to do it on Fiverr, iFreelance,etc) and learning to do links myself. I have plenty of time and little money. Thanks,

Bob, you asked some excellent questions and believe it or not, you’re already doing some ‘off-site’ SEO by asking your question here and including a link to your site in the comment form.

You said that you have “plenty of time and little money”, which is a common problem many of us share. If that is the case, spending $99 or $199 per month for links is not a good idea…yet.  Let me explain…

In the most recent Google algorithm update a few months ago, they targeted sites that had very little content, or redundant content. Hundreds of thousands of websites virtually disappeared from the Google index, or found themselves on page 98,000.

We need to remember that Google’s goal is to provide what it believes are the best results for a particular search query. A website with little or no content will not rank well regardless of the number or quality of links pointing to it. So, that should answer your question about Bluehost’s linking deal.

At the risk of shameless self-promotion, Bob, I would strongly encourage you to get a copy of my book before you start paying for links or any other SEO services. In my book, I discuss basic page design and critical SEO factors that you need to include, and I hate to tell you that your site is not scoring well at this moment.

‘Local Search’ is one of Google top initiatives and the only piece of information on your page is a phone number. Unfortunately, that phone number is part of a graphic and Google can’t see that your phone number is area code 650.

You have two images on the page and your primary logo image is named, “he_logo.jpg”. Renaming that image to something such as, “san_mateo_electric.jpg” would give Google more information to index.

The only text on your entire page is www.HillsboroughElectric.com and that doesn’t give Google enough information to display your site in results for any search query.

As to creating content for your website, I would encourage you to do this personally before you consider outsourcing.  Nobody knows your business or industry as well as you, so share that information on your site.

Once you feel that you have the basics covered, feel free to outsource, but know that you will need to rewrite almost everything you get from such a source. With the exception of some excellent talent in the Philippines, most outsource firms employ people where English is a second language and most articles will read that way.

Bob, you’re on the right track, but you need to do things in the proper order. You don’t want links before you have some content posted. In fact, you really don’t want to do anything proactively until your site can stand on its own explaining who you are, what you do and where you’re located.

My book, the SEO & Social Media Marketing Guide was written with people like you in mind. People who know they need a website, but can’t afford to hire a professional firm and are not sure where to start or what to do. This is why I offer a “No questions asked guarantee!”  If my book doesn’t meet your expectations – get your money back.  Just one idea could make you thousands!  But, I want you to take 60 days to review my book and decide if this information isn’t worth much more than the cover price.  With no risk, you have nothing to lose!

Best of luck to you, my friend and thanks for taking the time to comment on this blog.

PS: I love the look of your site so far and the pic, now you need to feed Google with a bunch of keyword-rich text.

PPS: If you need links, how about 650 one-way links…see this.

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