Forum Moderators: martinibuster
Since that time 5 years ago there has been no SEO done to the site. No link development, no onpage stuff, nothing. And guess how it's rankings are doing?
Well, 5 years later, it's still front page on Google for the competitive terms we targetted originally. Through all the ups and downs, all the algo tweaks, that site has parked on the front page and sat there, year after year, generating traffic...and sales, with not a further penny spent on SEO. The site is owned by an individual practitioner who earns a very good living completely off of his site. We speak once or twice a year, and yes, he's happy. It beats sites that do directory links and press releases. It beats sites that sponsor wordpress themes. It beats sites that do paid blogging. It beats a lot of sites that do SEO.
I'm still considering what I should charge to let out the techniques I used that have managed to keep this site on the front page for 5 years, or even if I should discuss it publicly at all.
1) Sites that rank (i.e. do searches)
2) sites that link to sites that rank.
Variations on searches really help a lot. Searching 'widgets' is obvious (see the sites that rank, then the sites that link to those sites that rank). But try stuff like widget blogs, widget directories, widget stores, buy widgets online, widget history.
Then when you're cruising those sites, if you find one that looks like an authority, check a few things. First, check the backlinks - lots of dusty old authorities have links from other dusty old authorities. Secondly, read the page for topics that are related to your niche - you can find additional searches that you may not have thought of.
That doesn't define what an authority site is, but it's generally how I find most of my link requests.
