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Google is in Charge of the World

Or at least they will be before long. I was out with a friend the other day and he mentioned that Google is creating a driverless car. Talk about knowing what your business is about! Still I guess with Google it was always global domination. So what’s that got to do with anything? Well I used to get most of my business through my website. Then Google changed some rules and I don’t get that business any more. I know lots of other online businesses have suffered in the same way. Anyway I’ve been doing a little studying and learning all about how to make web pages more attractive to search engines and since about 90% of search engine traffic is generated by Google that means making websites conform to what Google wants rather than what I think is most useful, entertaining and interesting for my customers.

You see when I build my website for my customers, Google doesn’t send me any traffic. I have to worry about ensuring that each page is focused on a keyword. I have to make sure that keyword is mentioned about a gazillion times on that page in order for Google to ‘get’ that that keyword is what that page is about and people searching on that keyword might be interested in this page. This means that language can’t flow the way it would otherwise which is irritating because it means I have to write stuff, and then change it to ensure the keyword is mentioned often enough – frequently at the beginning (once every ten words), but with a lower frequency as the page goes on.

I also have to persuade lots of places to link to my page in order for Google to take it seriously, but if I just swap links (which seems fair) then Google pretty much ignores the link.

I tried to pay Google to send traffic to my page but they hit me with what’s called the Google Slap where they don’t think your website obeys their arbitrary rules (which it actually did – simply because I run an ethical business). In my case, however, I operate in an industry (weight loss) where there are innumerable unethical businesses, and so I’m tarred with the same brush – presumably by some automatic system, because if they’d bothered to read what I was selling they’d have seen how my claims were perfectly legit and backed up by scientific research.

Anyway, as a consequence of Google’s megalomania I’m discovering a load of interesting stuff I didn’t know about how search engines assess web pages. It’s also forced me to tidy up my site’s navigation. When I created it a few years ago it was all nice and neatly organised and planned. But as time passes I add new pages, get new ideas, and slowly it’s got into a bit of a mess, so much so that I can’t find pages I put up a couple of weeks ago, ‘cos I don’t know how to get to them. So I’m doing a little re-structuring of how it all connects while I’m changing the code to make it more search engine friendly. I’m also adding links to make it easy to share pages or comments with friends via link buttons and facebook.

If you want to see the couple of pages I’ve done so far (I only started yesterday) check out
http://www.hypnosisiseasy.com/downloads.htm
and
http://www.hypnosisiseasy.com/scriptdownloads.htm

Let’s hope Google notices the changes.

Michael

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Essential Training

I’ve spent today with the lovely Sara Lou-Ann Jones (Master Trainer in NLP, Hypnotherapy and Life Coaching) who was running her 1 day Effective Marketing Course for Therapists, at the Hypnotherapy Centre of Excellence in Manchester.  It was certainly a feature packed day with practical exercises, tons of useful information and even a visit from a web design expert to ensure that this aspect of marketing was included in your marketing strategy. Blogs were mentioned, naturally, so I was happy to own up to already having one – even though I’ve only been blogging for a week and am not aware of anyone actually reading my words just yet.

I’ve taken stacks of notes that I need to sort through and put into some sort of action plan, and Sara also provided a very useful handout which I was pleased to see was full of additional material and not just a copy of the material covered during the day.

You can find out more information at

http://excelwithhypnotherapy.com/hypnotherapy-courses-manchester.html

If you could do with more clients, then you would do well to consider attending this course.

Author: Michael J. Hadfield

Source: Hypnosisiseasy