Hahahaha – OK the title is a bit strong here but I was a bit pushed for space in terms of making it nice and succinct.  Also, that’s the turn of phrase I couldn’t get out of my head when I read the question so in true Kirsty “I’ve thought it so I absolutely have to say it now” style – I decided to let it out

A better way to put the question I asked would be “Ask Kirsty – Why Does Your Site Not Comform to the “Rules” of SEO and Yet Is Still Somehow Generating Heaps Plenty Traffic?”, but it wasn’t as catchy see?

Over to you Scott…

Hi Kirsty,

I just read your great post on getting to 50,000 visits…congrats!

The essence of your post intrigued me enough to do some research.

Though I have been around web page building for a decade, I am relavitely newto Internet/Affiliate Marketing, and when you mentioned about how to focus on the next niche, it started me thinking.

If many noobies are like myself, we learn SEO/SEM along the way, so by the time its time for the next niche project, there are changes to be made because of what has been learned (the good and the bad). It is funny that we tend to maybe
not do what made the previous site successful, though it may just be an attempt to do SEO/SEM better, not knowing the consequences.

Take for instance lingeriebrands.co.uk…per the SEO ‘experts’ point of view, your home page is not properly configured- you have 302 META keywords (the ‘experts’ say you should be limited to 25 max), no META description, only 1 external link, no H1 titles, limited content per keyword throughout the site, and yet your site does extremely well.

I’m kind of analytical, which can be a negative at times…of your site’s 302 KWs, 202 rank in the top 100, 59 are on the first page of Google UK, and 9 are in first position, and your site has a PR2 ranking.

So what is it then that has made the site successful?

You have 658 backlinks, and looks like you have used a variety of tactics, including backlinking from many of your other sites, and other created blog sites.

May I inquire if you presently use or had subscriped to a backlinking service?

Another plus here is probably the 2,100+ pages of content and age of your site.

So if this was my niche site, I would be confused, based on SEO/SEM guidance I have read, etc.

I am curious how you would focus on your next project, knowing the above. Maybe the secret formula, however, is…

Proper niche research
Take ACTION!
Add content, continuously
Be PATIENT

Hahahaha – great question Scott!

I used to be a full time SEO consultant and spent lots of time doing titles, meta keywords, and descriptions with mathematical precision. Keyword densities were calculated as were things like volume of link text, headers etc etc etc. To my annoyance lots of people who were ignoring these “rules” seemed to be doing really well.

In the end I concluded that I could keep up my knowledge of all the exact intricacies of SEO or I could adopt a new and more basic set of rules that would allow me to “just get on with it” in terms of providing quality content and concentrating upon the broader spectrum of things an affiliate has to be good at to run a successful business.

* Add good quality content, and lots of it.
* Make it natural but still write it with half an eye on using lots of different descriptive terms around the products I’m writing about and remembering the content is supposed to be on a certain theme.
* Make sure I don’t overstuff keywords (I’ve done this by accident at times when concentrating too hard on page design and things like Adwords QS).
* Create good page structures both for SEO and the user. By focusing on the user I can maximise the amount of traffic I get through to merchant (around 80% for that site).
* As for all the meta stuff… I’ve not found much benefit to spending time on it any more. Google largely ignores it and I’ve found if I have good, compelling prose on my pages the description displayed by Google is A-OK anyhow.

As for why my site is successful, I think it is simply because I’ve put a lot of effort into good page structure, decent navigation (it could be better on that site TBH) and targeting lots of relevant traffic. I think you can have all the analysis and precise SEO in the world, but there is never a substitute for good content.

Do I use a backlinking service? Yes, I use Content Now (Note to self: I must start invoicing them for the links I give them on this blog). I’ve also started to get a fair few good quality “spontaneous links” from sites (which again goes back to decent content). I think your analysis of the secret formula is dead on. Particularly the “be patient” bit. It’s taken the site 2 years to get to the stage its currently at and its frequently gone through long periods of non growth regardless of the content I’ve been adding. Lots of people get discouraged when that happens but perseverance pays off and you tend to see a reward for your content efforts in the end.

Hope this helps

P.S.  I’d like to thank Scott for all the facts and figures in that question.  I think it was one of the most thoroughly researched questions I have ever gotten since the blog started.

• Ask Kirsty – I’m Crap at Affiliate Marketing – Help!!
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