12 Months with Google and Brett

How did you fair

[jamsy]

Well its a few days over 12 months since Brett started that great Successful Site in 12 Months with Google Alone [webmasterworld.com] thread, so how did you all fair ;)

Do those 26 things, and I guarantee you that in ones years time you will call your site a success. It will be drawing between 500 and 2000 referrals a day from search engines.

I did and have seen my site blossom really well in google with outstanding results - daily referrals at present are on average 2,300 in a VERY competitive field.

I must confess when i first read the article i said to myself 12 months is a long time in this game and to start preparing now for 12 months time is a waste. Thankfully I ended up employing the tactics in April 02 and boy has the time flown.

Thanks Brett - I will be reaching for that donate button ;)

[Krapulator]

Yeah I agree! Three cheers for Brett and Webmasterworld. In the last eight months I have increased traffic to my employers website fivefold. This was after removing all the dodgy doorway pages/hidden links etc that an SEO company had added before I began here.

Hip Hip Hooray!

[Brett_Tabke]

Thanks jamsy.

Just FYI, the noted post is part of an upcoming book by Tara Calishain and can be preordered from O'Reilly now. (Google Hacks [oreilly.com]).

[aus_dave]

I agree too, Brett's article is a great resource to get you thinking about how to shift away from the dreaded 'brochure' site.

I'm also wondering how often people have been adding content to their site. I find 2 or 3 new pages a month is about all I can do - need an idea first, then write it, then get the layout/links/format all working. Plus run the 'core' business as well!

My site will probably take longer than 12 months to reach the 500-2000 referrals a day range but I have seen the benefits of following Brett's advice after only a few months ;).

[Craig_F]

yup, good post brett. I knew everything in there having done similar stuff for a while, but I have to admit once I read your post I became more focused and the results have been great. It's actually uspetting to think my newbie competitors get to read it right out of the gate. I wish it was there when I started!

[jimh009]

The best post ever on this forum was Bretts 12 months post. And, more importantly, it works, too.

My site was started in May but first went live in October when Google picked it up. I first read Bretts post back in September, and spent better than 2 months cleaning up my site due to many mistakes.

Even before reading bretts post, I had a ton of content. After the post, I added even more with yet more on the way. The biggest thing, though, about Bretts post is that it sort of "reinforced" my belief that content is what draws traffic in search engines and that content is very helpful for the long term sustainability of a web site.

In any event, 6 months after my site has gone live, I get around 700 - 900 SE referrals per day, with total traffic of around 1000-1200 per day. And it climbs every month.

Thanks Brett for that wonderful post!

Jim

:)

[webdevsf]

I agree. That post was very helpful. We opened our site to the search engines in August 2002. We are now getting over 3500 visitors a day from search engines.

Thanks Brett! :)

[brotherhood of LAN]

its been a little longer than 12 months, but a relatively untouched site is still going bang with the plan.

Only difference I see is the "money keyword" referrals making the base of the "theme pyramid" that much more wider.

I still firmly believe Brett's post about file sizes is true too :)

[jleland]

Thanks for the info!

[EquityMind]

One of the first posts that I bookedmarked from here.

[KakenBetaal]

Thank you, Brett! I've been using this extensively and it sure benefited my site a great deal. Google referrals are up more than 50 times what they were a year ago.

[creative craig]

Not 12 months by a long shot but I am using that article as a guide though :)

Craig

[Andrew Thomas]

Brett - Is your 12 month guide still worth a go, or has google changed in any way in the last year, that your method will no longer work for the following 12 months.

Only I have a few sites on the go, where i will be able to add regular content from now on, and I will give your method a go, as the results by other members looks impressive.

well done everyone....and Brett

[Monkscuba]

It was one of the most useful things i found when first on this site. We don't get that many referrals, since we are not in such a popular area, but our Google rankings are blooming nicely. Cheers.

[Marketing Guy]

I was fortunate enough to start a site in October 2002 that I could write a lot of content for and thanks to WW and Brett (OK, and Google! ;)) I just broke the 500uv per day mark last month!

Onward and upward!

Thanks a lot Brett for WW and fantastic information - Thanks to the mods and admin for keeping the forum the top resource there is - Thanks to everyone else for sharing and contributing!

Long may it continue!

Scott

[Brett_Tabke]

>guide still worth a go, or has google
>changed in any way in the last year

After this post popped up last night, I reread it line for line and was going to update it. I couldn't find anything to add. It's just as workable today as it was last year. It's a rather timeless approach to promotion actually. It should still be working next year.

[Andrew Thomas]

Thanks brett - thats what i was hoping you would say - I'll start tonight :)

[eyeinthesky]

3 cheers to Brett!

My site unique visitors went from 100 to 700 in about 7 months.

What will we do without Brett?

[dazz]

It is a classic, it was one of the 1st posts i read when i found this place and bookmarked it straight away!

my site is about 8 months old and gets about 1200 ish uniques per day from SE's.

I think ill go read it again!

[rogerd]

Yup, that's a classic. One site I've put quite a bit of time into was based around a lot of Brett's philosophy and is now seeing over 1M pageviews per month.

I can give Brett credit for part of that success in another way, too. The great popularity of WebmasterWorld is not just due to performance in Google or other SEs, but because the way this forum is run keeps people coming back. The biggest part of my aforementioned site's traffic is repeat visitors and forum users. Once you get people to your site, you want them to return again - Brett's showed us how to accomplish that, too. :)

[limbo]

Hadn't seen this before now - I started to read it, thought this is golddust, Ctrl P - Now i can give it the time it deserves.

One of the best postings I've read to date.

WW is quite the most rich and valuable web resource there is. Must remember to contribute when the next paycheck rolls in.

Cheers Brett et al.

Limb:)

[Tor]

It should still be working next year.

I`m sure that this "formula" will work next year also. I would call it the 26 Commandments of succsessful Google ranking.

[gracedpoet]

Brett, you are a SEO Genius!

I followed your 12 month plan and it worked to a T... I'm on many #1, #2 #3 keywords and sometimes am on all 3.

Google no longer a total mystery! YOUR!@ MONTH PLAN made ALL THE DIFFERENCE in my ascent from 10 to over 1,000 hits, and your advice about studying the logs and targeting the people who actually are finding you, worked like a charm.

Great thread.

Grace

[ciml]

> Ctrl P

limbo, I wonder how many people have printed and digested that post. Quite a few, I imagine.

Brett wanted to get to the "time proven methods on Google"; it looks as Fresh now as it did then so I think we can safely say he succeeded.

[nipear]

On the week of 7/28/02 I had 50,227 page views across all my sites.

Last week I had 344,585 page views across all my sites.

And this week will be well above that number...

Just remember to plan, plan, plan. I started well before July on "fixing" my sites and adding new ones. We have several new sites that will be coming online soon. And I expect our weekly page views to be over 2 million by the end of this year! And sales from our ecommerce sites should be over 1 million for the year.

Thanks Brett and WebMasterWorld :)

[DrDoc]

Two years ago I launched a site that became one of the most successful new sites in its genre. After 12 months it had 100.000 unique visitors per day.

I am now working on a new site. Similar, but better. A lot of new functions and services.

Brett, your 26-step guide will come in very handy! I had not seen it before, but it's bookmarked, printed, saved .. and I plan to use it!

Even though I basically knew everything in there (from hard work and experience) I can tell that I've missed the goal by miles. Now, applying your suggestions to my previous and current knowledge will give my site a boost to a goal I was first worrying about reaching. Now I know I will!

[TylerDurden]

Thank you very much, Brett!

I personally think this article is de-facto Google SEO bible.
I'm only at month 4 of applying Brett's advice and already getting 2K visitors/day in a very competetive area.
Also this great article convinced me that only ethical SEO tactics and constant content development is a way to go for webmaster looking for long-time success.

Can't resist from repeting: Thank you very much, Brett.

Tyler

[Yidaki]

I can't say it in numbers but brett's guide helped me a lot and still does so. It's a learning curve and every day i understand more of what he wrote. And don't forget the great article about search engine theme pyramids [searchengineworld.com] and the Theme Search Engines analyses [searchengineworld.com]. It's a perfect combination - and this is a brilliant place!

[BigDave]

The reason that the post is timeless is that Brett stuck with the basics, including the hardest one of all . . . patience.

If you actually plan on a site taking 12 months to get to the top, you are less likely to take the shortcuts that will get you in trouble.

Content, incoming links, internal link structure and patience.

My site is now 5 months old, with about 1250 uniques a day. The traffic has been growing at 35-50% per month. But what really matters is that I just came back from a trade show and everyone knew who we were and they wanted to deal with us.

[taxpod]

Wish I had something like that when I tried to learn to hit a curveball. Fundamentals are key. But the thing I really like about it is that even if you're lazy, like me, and you only follow a few of these items, you'll see solid improvement.

Oh, I'm now averaging 2,200 from pure Google but I also get lots from Yahoogles, AOLoogles and country specific Googles. Now if I can start to see something, anything, from Alta Vista, I'll be very happy.