ABOUT ME

I’m Darrel Pontejo, a man of discipline, passion and dedication. I live my life in three different areas – An SEO Specialist, A Musician, and A Family Man. It’s not easy, and I admit, it’s goddamn hard! Soooo hard! Can’t explain it in words… So what’s my secret?

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Darrel Pontejo

The Value of Your SEO Content

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The value or worth of your SEO content depending on google can actually be very different from the quality of your content. Writing a blog by putting words together is easy but to create a quality SEO content, you might have to dig a little deeper than that. The quality of your content does matter, but there are also things you have to look out for if you want to have a quality SEO content.

Creating your SEO content can be considered as one of the hardest things to do and although it may be complicated, it is still not impossible. Now, how does google determine high-quality content? Well, google has two ways to determine if the content is of high quality and the first one is to look at the behavior and actions happening on the page like for example, the amount of time people dwell on the page and the average time they do. The second one would be the raters. Google hires people to check up on certain sites to see and rate for themselves if the content is true of high quality.

One thing that normal blogs do not have which is the reason why SEO is so important is the use of a keyword or keywords. Being aware of which keywords you are actually optimizing before you start is something you would want to do because when you start writing, you should focus on your keyword or keywords to make sure that it is noticed. Keywords have competitions and picking your battles correctly allows your website to grow and become more noticed. Some keywords have high competitions and others have low competitions but what you wanna do is assess yourself if your website is ready to battle at either a low competition or a high competition keyword. Sometimes SEO users seem to get lost when it comes to picking their keywords as they start to use keywords that do not have that much relevance to the actual content. Stay away from keywords which have different intent and although it could mean the same, look at it from a buyer’s point of view.

Make use of your headline! The headline is the first thing that people see and if you do not make use of it, you lose the chance to make a better impression. Although you are limited to 65 characters, putting a keyword into your headline is something you would want to do as doing this allows Google to notice you and depending on how noticeable you are, who knows, this could be a reason why you would rank up.

The value of the SEO content of your site depends entirely on you as there are more things to look at rather than just the quality of the content. Although the quality of the content is still very important, missing out the other details will just leave the content unnoticeable.

SEO Tactics on How to Get More Organic Traffic Part 2

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Organic traffic as mentioned in the first part of this article is something you would want to achieve as an SEO (search engine optimization) user. Although it may be a bit hard to achieve organic traffic at first, there are actually a few tips or tricks to make your site more organically attractive.

These tips were mentioned in the first part of this article:

  • Changing your URL structure

Changing your URL by sequencing the importance of different pages of your website allows search engines to understand your website better and becoming able to display it in just the way it is structured.

  • Getting rid of low quality/low traffic pages

Getting rid of unwanted material that drags you down allows you a cleaner, simplified, and understandable website that is sure to keep your audience interested.

Here are examples of those possible pages

    1. No relevance
    2. Mergeable pages
    3. Useless pages
    4. Outdated content
    5. Thin content
    6. Low-volume keyword audience

Now that we have mentioned what was discussed in the first part of this article, let us move on to different ways that can help you generate more organic traffic.

  • Page Speed

Have you ever wondered why most of the top websites are very clean, neat, and simplified? Because they want to invest in their page speed. Depending on the average connection speed of your audience. The moment you decide to avoid putting useless material that may cause your website to be slower and focus on the things that matter with still a form and sense of beautification, you will allow your audience to enjoy a simple site that does not exaggerate and gives them what they want.

Choosing the right form of image and the right amount of pixels you allow on your videos are direct factors that could either take up less or more of your page and will directly affect the page speed.

  • Internal Links

Applying internal links to your page works great in both a technical aspect and a psychological aspect. Although this may seem unimportant, doing this has a huge effect on not just your site but also your audience as well.

    • Technical

The technical effect of putting internal links on your page is that it allows the search engine to understand you even more by understanding the connection of that page towards the internal links you put making it easier for the search engine to associate certain searches towards you.

    • Psychological

Having another option to click even if it is inside the website itself creates the illusion of a different perspective, a different material, or basically a different page to click. Having this allows audience the freedom to be able to wonder but within your website itself still keeping them close to you.

These are a few tips that once put into good use may really affect your site by bringing in even more organic traffic possibly transforming your website as one of the top ranked websites on google.

SEO Tactics on How to Get More Organic Traffic Part 1

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Getting organic traffic is something which we SEO (search engine optimization) users dream of achieving. Getting the most organic traffic towards your site attracts a lot of genuine attention turning your viewers into followers, followers into subscribers, and later on subscribers into paying customers. But where does this all start? Traffic. Traffic basically refers to the amount of attention your site is getting.

How are you going to funnel people into your site by creating organic traffic? Well, lucky for you, here are a few tips you can use to generate organic traffic:

  • Changing your URL structure

In the earlier days of SEO, a flat URL structure was preferred but as times have changed, so does the flat URL. Adding in a logical sequence or hierarchy allows search engines to understand your website better enough to be able to present what the website is like itself.

Being able to understand the sequence of your URL in an SEO perspective is to imagine individual pages in your website as a couple of nested buckets. Since your home page is your core topic, imagine it as your largest bucket and as the importance of certain pages get smaller, so do the buckets inside them. You should be able to create certain levels of importance and this will definitely help you shape your URL.

  •  Getting rid of low quality/low traffic pages

Although you may still think that the more pages you have the better, this is not entirely true. It is okay to have a numerous amount of pages but if they are just clutter, then it is better to throw them away.

Here are examples of those possible pages

    • No relevance

Pages with no relevance whatsoever towards your current important page can be considered as clutter no matter how nice they may be. The main fact that they are off topic means you should not give importance to them as they may deviate your audience.

    • Mergeable pages

If you can simplify three pages into one, why not do it? Avoiding a numerous amount of pages with irrelevant content is not as good as having a few pages with really solid content.

    • Useless pages

Getting rid of useless pages allows you to declutter and helps keep your audience back on track saving them from the risk of getting lost.

    • Outdated content

Outdated content may not always be good for you. If you have a post about a certain study that was dated in 2004 and another one about the same topic that was done in 2017, then it is time to let go of the older post as to avoid confusion and as to keep your site up to date.

    • Thin content

Thin content does not give that much satisfaction to your audience and you should avoid giving them something without substance as it may just backfire on you later on by them growing distaste for your material.

    • Low-volume keyword audience

Get rid of those keywords where you know are not going to work because of the low-volume of audience that actually use their keywords. It is ok to have a lot of keywords in place. You just have to make sure that they are relevant.

To be continued…

Questions to Ask Your New SEO Client (Part 2)

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As discussed in the first part of this article, there are a few things you may want to ask your new SEO client before you go into business. Why? Because it protects both of you and it will also allow you to do a much better job later on with your work.

In the first part of this article, the importance of knowing the client’s business information has been stated. Here are the questions you may have missed in the first article:

 

  • Which actions are important?
  • Specific level of importance on site activities
  • Who’s your target audience, target market, or target customer?
  • List specific sectors to be targeted
  • Client’s unfair advantage
  • Reasons why prospects do not choose you
  • Measure your success

 

The previous questions have been asked to be able to know the client’s business information and now the following questions will be more on how you and your client can function well together.

Possible Issues and Problems

Discussing the possible issues and problems before hand helps you from becoming a nervous wreck once a problem is experienced. Okay, maybe not a nervous wreck but it is definitely better to prepare for a problem before it happens before it is too late.

 

  • Do you think there are any problems in your current data?

 

Your client might already have problems existing in their current data that you might just be able to fix. Even a slight suspicion may go a long way. Ask your client if in his current website, something does not make sense. Do not forget to ask why. Check the website out and find out any problems in their current data yourself.

 

  • Do you own other domains?

 

If your client already owns other domains, you can ask them if they want you to uniform your work with the existing work or which part of their existing domains do they like and dislike as you may copy and improve the things they like and change what they dislike.

 

  • Does other copies of the material on your site exist?

 

Knowing if there are copies of the material on your client’s site exists is very important if you are to make your client distinctive and even better than their competitors.

 

  • Has the site been penalized

 

If there were any problems experienced in the past, it is a very good idea to know about that and what you can do to avoid it happening again.

Although just a few questions, these may really have a very big effect on not just your client relationship but also your work.

Questions to Ask Your New SEO Client (Part 1)

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Getting a new client can always be exciting for you as it is an additional income and also another project which you may feel challenged by. New clients although exciting, must be taken seriously and with precaution because you will never know what might happen in the future between you and your client that might even affect your business together.

Asking questions before accepting a certain person or company as your client is something you should not be afraid of doing as it does benefit you in the long run. Although it may be a bit bothering at first, it does work well in the long run and your client will understand. In fact, asking your client certain questions puts you at a good spot because you care about your relationship and therefore are setting the terms for both of you.

Let us divide the questions into a few parts to be sure that you will not get confused.

Client’s business information

Getting the information about a client’s business is the very basic set of questions you need to ask maybe even before striking a deal. A client’s information is necessary because it dictates your work in a very heavy way.

 

  • Which actions are most important?

 

Free trials, webinar sign ups, newsletter sign ups, or any others. Specify which actions do they want done more importantly than others. Eliminate the actions that they do not think are of any interest to them unless those actions are absolutely necessary.

 

  • Specific level of importance on site activities

 

Once they have given you a list of the important actions to be done on their site, let them proceed to rate each action in terms of importance. Knowing which actions are more important than others allows you to give more focus on the certain actions that your client wants. This also helps you design and prioritize actions on the website in a way pleasing to the client.

 

  • Who’s your target audience, target market, or target customer?

 

Knowing your client’s target audience, target market, or target customer helps you know how to design the website in a way that is automatically attractive to the client’s target audience, target market, or target customer.

 

  • List specific sectors to be targeted

 

Work with your client in listing certain sectors of the society that are in line with your target audience, target market, or target customer which you can directly target and would save you the additional expenses of redirecting your focus later on.

 

  • Client’s unfair advantage

 

Here is the fun part, know your client’s unfair advantage. Talk to them thoroughly about it because this will make your clients even more happy when you are later on able to advertise and promote their unfair advantage raking in more subscribers or even customers.

 

  • Reasons why prospects do not choose you

 

Sadly, you need to know your client’s weaknesses and how to deal with them. Once you know or learn their weakness, you will be able to redesign your website in a way that covers and makes up for your client’s specific weakness or weaknesses

 

  • Measure your success

 

Ask your client how they measure success. Ask them the specific digits in which they can consider themselves successful. Once you learn how to measure success, you will be able to set a quota or a goal for yourself that will make both you and your client happy.

To be continued…

Cross-Channel Optimization to Increase your ROI

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The SEM (search engine marketing), SEO (search engine optimization) and PLA (product listing ads) are three different channels you might want to play with. Having one channel is nice but to be able to reach maximum visibility and maximum involvement therefore increases your ROI (return of investment), you will have to use a combination of the three.

Why is cross-channel optimization important?

Different results may appear on different sections of the SERP (search engine results page). Organic listing, text ads, product listing ads, local results, image results, news results and many more can be found on your SERP (search engine results page) which is why the SERP (search engine results page) is a good place to monitor the results of your efforts and keep track of which sections are more effective than others which can help you later on by reevaluating your marketing strategy.

The benefits of cross-channel optimization:

  • For the Weak SEO (search engine optimization)

If your organic rank is not that high, you can quickly gain top visibility by boosting your paid efforts through the use of SEM (search engine marketing) or PLA (product listing ads)

  • Save your money on your SEM (search engine marketing)

If your organic rank is naturally stronger, you can adjust your SEM (search engine marketing) to save yourself from spending more than you need to.

  • Base your efforts on your SERP (search engine results page) and not individual channels

Now that you have a platform for comparison and evaluation, you are able to focus on the channels that give you actual and effective results. For example, if displayed on your PLA that your keyword has appeared on the top of the list, you will be able to make a decision based on the effectivity of this channel whether to cut cost or invest more.

Cross-channel optimization disadvantages:

Although cross-channel optimization is one of the best things that has happened to us marketers, there are still downsides to it’s usage.

  • Uncomparable departments

The SEO, SEM, and PLA operate in different fields therefore becoming hard to compare. Comparison of these departments usually are inaccurate since they all perform a different role. Since it is hard to compare, allocating your efforts can also be a bit tricky.

  • Data availability

Data availability is up to you. Collecting data is a dirty and tiresome job because of the several hours of research and efforts extent to collect them but data is most necessary for optimization. Without sufficient data, optimization will not be possible.

  • Competition

Even if you have a sufficient amount of data, your competition might have more data than you. Competition can become complicated because of the availability of data. Having more data than your competitors is almost impossible to attain because of the unavailability of comparison. It is not like you can just ask your competition about their data.

Cross-channel optimization has both positive and negative sides which leaves the decision up to you whether or not you will engage in this kind of procedure.

4 Paid B2B Mistakes You Shouldn’t Commit

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Generating great organic traffic is every B2B’s dream but let us face it, you can not reach that far with pure organic traffic. Sometimes paid ads is necessary to increase visibility and accessibility whether we like it or not. Do not look at paid ads as a bad thing because they really do help increase your traffic if done right. Although they are a great help, you still have to do it properly for maximum results.

Save yourself from these novice mistakes by watching out for the following:

  • Rush Launching

We want to be successful and we want to be successful now! This is a scary thing to do. If you are not ready to launch, no matter how much you spend, it will not be enough. Do not go into battle unprepared and make sure your website is ready for all sorts of communication made to your clients by being prepared. Not being to launch on time is so much better than launching even if you are not ready. Although setbacks are not good, save yourself from wasting money by launching only when you are ready.

  • Decision Making with Insufficient Data

Making a decision with insufficient data is another thing you do not want to do. A good decision is made only when you have weighed in the data presented to you.

How do you know when the data you have is enough?

When you have seen enough angles of the decision you are going to make and when you have full trust in that decision based on the data presented. Like any other decision making, do not rush into a decision just because you are in a hurry.

  • Not Bidding on Brand

Your brand name as a keyword is something you should not take for granted. Although this may not seem like such an important factor. You have to be as easy to find as possible should you want to generate both organic and paid traffic. Branded keywords also usually cost less! Instead of wasting an amount of money, you can now adjust your fund and spend more on visibility.

  • Resisting Certain Tactics

Some tactics work and some tactics do not. Let us face it, no matter how genius we think our tactics are, there is always the risk of failure. The goal is to minimize the risk. You do not have to completely follow certain tactics but resisting them completely could lead to your downfall. It is up to you to create your tactics and it is always so much better to create your tactics based on other tactics that have already proven themselves effective.

  • One Man Band

Yes, you can do it yourself. But at the same time, you actually can not. Although it seems like something you can do alone, you are putting yourself at risk of failure since there is no one to back you up and there are so many factors you have to watch out for. Failing in one area means you will have to focus on that area. What about the other areas? Do not put yourself through unnecessary risk and start trusting people to help you succeed.

Save yourself from these mistakes and have a successful B2B paid platform!

The Best Practices for Collecting and Sharing Information from Social Media

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In a time where social media is one of the most powerful tool almost every company, person, influencer, and brand nowadays is striving to be a social media power users. Social media can not be denied as the best way to reach people in our current time but the real question is, how do we share today’s most important and relevant web content to our audience without having to go through extreme lengths and spending extreme effort only to land on an unsuccessful and unattractive result?

Learning how to efficiently collect, modify, and repost the information in which you gather is the most important thing you should be aware of if you want to keep your audience interested.

Here is a list of ways which can help you successfully collect, modify, and repost information:

  • Identify your Source
    • Premium Source

Premium sources are those sources who come from authority and are sources which should be regarded as the ultimate authentication of information. For example: if you want to learn about the stock market, it is better to go online and check the website rather than rely on people’s blogs or opinions. Making sure your source is accurate can sometimes be a bit difficult since there are a lot of different sources but once you find that source, it will make your job so much easier.

    • Niche Source

A niche source can be opinionated but not too opinionated because a niche source is suppose to show your audience a different perspective of the topic you are discussing. For example, you can read about current events anywhere but to get a niche source, you have to find someone who was part of that event to give his opinion on the specific event.

  • Collect and Organize

Once you have information from your sources both premium and niche, organize that information in a way that it can be read or presented harmoniously and smoothly. Avoid confusion and getting off topic.

  • Quality of your Content

Include the sources you need and leave out the sources you have no use for. Make sure everything you put is quality content and does not give you a second rate result. The quality of your content can be determined by basically cutting everything that is not needed and leaving only the important and useful information. It is good to make your content a bit entertaining and informative but avoid putting too much of something that may be irrelevant.

  • Modify

Modify your content into one that suits the personality of your website or whichever platform you wish to present on. Modifying is not specifically needed but it is very much advised to add personality.

  • Summarize

Once you are done with everything, do not forget to summarize. Lengthy paragraphs that can be turned into a few sentences and phrases that can be put together in a single word. This keeps your audience interest by making it easier for them to read or digest whatever it is you are trying to present to them.

Once you have done all of these, you are ready to repost your content. Use social media to your advantage and make your website attractive and enticing today.

Web Design 2017: The Top Trends to Practice

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Each year, website developers and professionals always look forward to the hottest trends in web design. This year is no different.

Web design 2017 trends are now here and surely business owners and industry leaders will adopt these developments. Doing so will keep web development leaders on top of the industry and website owners will gain even more traffic to their site and clients and sales, too.

Here are some of the trends in web design for this year, according to Business Zone:

Cutting Down Menu Options

In 2016, web developers started reformatting website and cut down menu options. In 2017, this practice may become a huge trend. Navigation menus with more than 5 options would be simplified to around just 3-4. This would allow website visitors to navigate through the site easier and in just a few clicks. Remember, a happy visitor translates to better traffic to the domain.

Dynamic Button for Call to Action

Call to action or CTA button is probably the most important element of a web design. At the same time, animation in websites is fast becoming one of the hottest trends. With this said, combining these two factors together would probably be the most useful change you can do for your website. An animated CTA would definitely impress visitors, which leads to a higher chance of them clicking the button.

Distinctive Images

Recent reports show that websites use stock images a whole lot lesser compared to a few years ago. This is mainly because of the fact that online users are now more fascinated with distinctive designs. As a result, we can expect for more web developers to use original images to keep guests interested and keep coming back to the page.

In addition to this, hand-drawn images would take flight in the web design industry this year. Nothing can make a website more exclusive than personalized drawings.

Dominance of Responsive Web Design

Responsive design will remain as one of the biggest trends in web design this year. This is mainly due to its functionality. This type of design allows website to be compatible with all kinds of devices. For this reason, it would seem that responsive design is here to stay.

Less Significance of the Homepage

This doesn’t mean that homepage will become obsolete. However, in 2017, web designers and owners would give more significance to landing pages, which are more valuable to the page’s marketing. Homepage will continue to be designed since it is still vital to the entire website. It would just take the backseat to give way to pages that bring more profit to the business.

Giving Importance to Overlaps and Overlays

Since 2016, this trend has become popular. Its status continues to this year. This is thanks to the fact that gradients and overlays help grab the visitors’ attention to the parts where developers and owners want people to see first.

Highlighting Content

Content is huge part of getting a great rank in search engines. This is why more and more website owners and designers would give emphasis to this element this year. Aesthetic trends may be excellent for sites but content remains as the king in web design. Therefore, expect this approach to become even more popular and vital for years and years to come.

Now that you know these web design 2017 trends, start applying them to your site to propel your business to the top.

Negative Off-Page SEO: Ways to Avoid Its Damaging Effects

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In some instances, website owners suffer from the effects of negative SEO. Either they unknowingly practice methods that they don’t know are detrimental to the ranking or a competitor site does ways to ruin the opposition. As a webpage owner, you surely want to know how to dodge this harmful bullet.

Before getting to the helpful tips, let us first define what negative off-page SEO really is. It is the exact opposite of search engine optimization. According to WP Site Care, the main purpose of this is to drop your site’s rankings too far down that no user can view your domain on search engines.

As what was mentioned earlier, you could mistakenly hurt your own site by doing practices that you don’t know can ruin your SEO or a rival site maliciously attacks your page to hurt your visitor traffic. The former is likely to happen if you personally see through the ranking optimization of your site and might have stumbled on tips to do so in the internet. The latter, well, it happens if a rival feels threatened of your site’s sudden popularity.

So, how do you exactly arm yourself and dodge these effects of negative SEO? Here the most common reasons for negative search engine optimization and how you can keep your site safe.

Spammy Links

A site’s ranking may not be totally damaged by a couple of spammy links. In contrast, negative ranking happens when links are built through link farms, Search Engine Land reveals. Link farms are a group of interconnected sites that use the same anchor text, which when clicked, directs the visitor to your website.

This sounds harmless. It actually is if the anchor text is a niche keyword to your domain and you don’t OVERDO the linking. However, if the anchor text is completely unrelated to your website and your page is linked to hundreds of it, Google makes you pay dearly for it.

A classic example of the effects of negative SEO this is what happened to WP Bacon, a partner of WP Site Care. An immense spam attack happened to the site in 2016. WP Bacon was linked more than a thousand times to an anchor text that is completely unrelated to its purpose and services. The keyword was “porn movie.” Although WP Bacon tried its best to retract the spammy domains, it didn’t gain its site back and eventually the page shut down for good.

If you’re personally trying to improve your SEO, you can moderate off-page links to your site. A few backlinks a week is enough to optimize your ranking. However, if the effects of negative SEO from a competitor, just like what happened to WP Bacon, you should regularly monitor your site’s link growth. This way, if you find a suspicious link, you can easily disavow it and prevent it from hurting your ranking.

One very helpful tool you can use is the SEO Spyglass. It shows you an abnormal spike in link growth and even allows you to disavow if you find a spammy link.
Scraping

Competitors use scraping to deliberately lower your site’s ranking. This strategy involves copying the exact content of your site and posting it across other webpages. How is this damaging?

The effects of this negative off-page SEO are felt because Google usually chooses only one version of the content to rank. Often, the search engine is able to detect where the piece originally comes from. However, these days, it has become more difficult to identify the original. Competitors typically monitor rival sites’ pages and as soon as new content is posted, it is copied and reposted right away.

To avoid this negative SEO, you could check duplicates of your content. There are various sites that can help you find duplication. Copyscape is one of the most useful tools for this. Once you find out that there’s a copy of your content in other websites, you can initially contact the webmaster and request for the piece to be taken down. However, if the owner won’t comply, the best solution is to file a copyright infringement report to Google.

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MISSION

My mission is to become a front runner in the Outsource Race by becoming a highly dependable source of outsource-related tasks.


VISION

Outsourcing has since played a significant role in every industry there is, and has paved the way for businesses to have global access.

CONTACT ME

If you are interested in working together, send me an inquiry and I will get back to you as soon as we can!



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