Removal Company Website.

[David Strover]

Hi Everyone,

Being retired I don't usually do much website work anymore, I've got three websites on the go and mainly as favours for ex-work colleagues who aren't too demanding but want an Internet presence. So far all is good.

One of my ex-colleagues is in the midst of working for the company I used to work for and setting up his own removal business in Swindon. So I used my trusty Xara and swotted up on the new SEO standards and away we went.

The result is here: http://www.kingsdownremovals.co.uk/

He is very pleased with the website. Soon he will be changing the nature of his business so a lot of the information on the site is going to be removed.

The question I'd really like to ask [aside from the obvious critiques] is how well is the site set up for SEO? It has been live for about four months now and still isn't anywhere on Google despite all the submissions and optimising. Now in my limited experience a good listing even for a brilliant optimised website can take the wrong side of six months but I'm not an expert and any advice is most welcome.

Just remember I am delicate flower so try to be kind and soft in your approach!

Thanks in advance

[gwpriester]

Looks professional and competent.

[David Strover]

Cheers Gary,

I don't think those words have ever been used in connection with me

I've been tempted to run it's URL through all those SEO check websites but everything I've ever read about them says they are a con and come up with spurious information. So I am hoping that my mate [and myself] are just being impatient for the listing on this site or that I've done something fairly daft and simple that I can rectify.

David

[Cloud]

SEO Basics:

Original Content
Relevant Content, and update it as often as you can
Links from other sites
H1,H2 etc tags
ALT text for images
Speed, the quicker the better
Relevant Page titles

and most importantly PATIENCE!

Google can take time to index and crawl your website so be patient. And don't forget that there is a tendency by clients to go for very competitive keywords and their competitors may have seo specialists working for them and may have been around on the web a lot longer. I notice that you have something like 30 keywords just on your home page, this really is not necessary, you should be targeting one keyword per page. And your page titles are far too long as well. The best thing is to do a search for seo and read anything by google themselves.

[David Strover]

Cheers Skeech,

That's what I needed. I know there is stuff he has to do - social media, getting himself listed on relevant and correct business website etc - and now I have a good list of what I should do. The H1 and H2 stuff still confuses me but this has given me a good start.

I have been preaching patience. What is your experience with this - [time it takes].

Many thanks
David

[Cloud]

How long is a cosmic string? It depends on which keyword you are searching for on google. If it is a very competitive keyword such as 'moving house' then you may be outside of the top 1000 if you are using a local based keyword such as 'removals company kingsdown' and you are not in the top few pages then something is wrong as by 4 months you should be listed. If you are using the latest version of webdesigner then you simply choose the heading text and select 'Heading 1' from the text style dropdown and this will select that word as your H1 tag.

Most of my sites achieve their position within a month or so. What you will find is that after listing your site on this forum that the site moves up in the search engines.

[David Strover]

Thanks very much for your help Skech.

If I was honest I was hoping you might pop along and have a look as I always keep an eye on what you do or say - so your advice is much appreciated. I do realise you have your own business and aren't here as a personal advisor!

If I'm honest I have built many website for myself and other people and SEO has always been the one thing that I have struggled with. Sometimes I used to get it right quite quickly and other times it would take ages before anything turned up. I seem to do nearly everything that you find on Google Webmaster advice etc but hey-ho I'll keep reading, asking and hopefully learning.

The site has turned up on a top four pages on one search term so obviously the little snippets you gave me are working.....I hope.