PR 0 to PR 4 in one month - This is what I did

Thanks WebmasterWorld!

[Web Footed Newbie]

Finally, after watching that PR bar for 30 days, I finally got PR4 on several of my sites pages.

THANKS to everyone here at WebmasterWorld!

Here is the chronology:
July 22 - posted newly designed site (gray bar - not indexed)
August 2 - indexed, showing PR 0
August 16 - indexed, showing PR 1
August 29 - indexed, showing PR 4! whippeee!

How did I do it?

I have read so many posts here that my eyes have started to bug out! That's

Here were my priorities:
1) Build good, "original" content - total site is 50 pages now, grows each week
2) Add new content every week
3) Links - every week, added more inbound and/or reciprocal links
4) Optimized every page for a particular keyword or phrase with page title, inbound link text, large H1 and H2 headings, first sentence of first paragraph, and filename path, meta description and meta keywords.
5) Keyword density = I used a minimum of 9% for all pages. Some are higher (13-15%).

Some other basics that I applied:
A) Kept pages small to load quickly, using CSS and tables to avoid code bloat.
B) Outbound link on every page to one or two high PR ranking sites.
C) Added a "link to me" page with detailed instructions on how to do it - Title, anchor text to use, thorough but small description, my contact info, my location (city/state), my email and my phone number if they need to call me.
D) Added a simple form for people to submit their site for me to link to them (suggested, but did not require, a reciprocal link), asking for the information above in #C except for phone number. Before, I requested info via an email. When I did this form, I got 20 TIMES the amount of requests because it was easy for the user!

So, what will I do now? Continue with #1 thru #5. After all, Content is King - just ask Brett or anyone else here!

BTW, I am not using any pay per click and pay for inclusion stuff at this point. We'll see with the future changes at Yahoo and Ink when the time comes.

Have a great day! WFN :)

[BlueSky]

Hey Newbie,

Thank-you for posting this and congratulations. When I read your post here just now, I thought: Dang, I put a site up a week before him and he's gotten ranked already. So, I quickly went and checked mine. Yesterday and before, it was at PR0. Today it's at PR6.

Like you, I read Brett's post and just followed it. I figured PR would take care of itself eventually. Sure enough it did.

[Web Footed Newbie]

Another important aspect for me (and I hope many others that are new to learning SEO) are my goals. There are so many nuances and other tricks in SEO that I just do not have the time to do it all on my own. That's when I seek help.

If I shop for a car, I like to know the specs and compare against other cars before I buy.

Goal 1
With SEO, I wanted to be sure I knew enough about it before I hire a professional to help with my SEO. As with every industry, there are experienced home run hitting veterans, and those that proclaim "great results" without many client references. So the point is, one of my goals was to know enough about SEO to effectively interview and hire a professional SEO (and weed out the spin doctors).

Goal 2
Create enough traffic for free on my own, creating cash flow, and then using this money to hire a professional SEO in Goal 1.

My do-it-myself approach was part of a learning curve in understanding the internet as a marketing tool. It is not my only means of marketing my business. The important thing to remember is time management here - it took me months to learn some of these things. And if you do not have the time to read hundreds of posts here and then apply what you learned in your website, get some help!

Now that I'm an informed "consumer," and my business is growing, I am at the point where I can afford to hire a SEO professional to take me the rest of the way.

By the way (BTW), all my pages do validate with W3C HTML 4.01 Transitional and with CSS.

For some of you new here, be sure and check out the tools, like HTML validator, keyword density, page size, etc. available here at WebmasterWorld's sister site:
[searchengineworld.com ]

P.S. A website is never done! WFN :)

[amazed]

hi newbie, you make me feel like in a time warp.

Do you mean e-business is still viable?

:-))

[AlexKing]

Web Footed Newbie,
Congratulations... Really great...
Try the next now... Absolutly new site published on Aug 15 11.00 pm ; indexed on Aug 16 6pm ; first visitor from Google on Aug 16 10.30pm ... Less than 24 hours from site published to first Google visitor (not PPC sure)...
And please don't listen somebody who would say that this is impossible... Done by me... No spam, no tricks... Just perfect SEO...

Good luck ))

[dirkz]

AlexKing, I assume you haven't told us about the PR9 site linking to your new site right from the start :)

[GranPops]

Alex.....
Brilliant....delighted for you cos have enjoyed a similar experience.

However...."Just perfect SEO".....now come on...

I am already 73 and if I live to be twice that age I will never get near; there are only two genius guys I know of in the world who might have a chance...and they aint saying nuffin'.

LOL

[Good_Vibes]

All this is very interesting, but I have had 5-6 sites go from a PR0 or PR1 to a PR 3-4 in the last update, without any changes or links added. It seems like Google has changed their algo somewhat to give many sites that boost.

[Gus_R]

It seems like Google has changed their algo somewhat to give many sites that boost

Site's index pages you saw already had their pr assigned but toolbar data wasn't updated.

[DaveAtIFG]

Well I'm disappointed. Somehow "Web Footed Journeyman" just doesn't have the same... flair... ;)

Nice work WFN!

[treeline]

Good job. Thanks for the inspiration!