Nancy’s post for today is found at Blog-World Watch and on the topic of custom blog templates.
Do You Need A Custom Blog Template?
You don’t need one really, that is a custom template, but you may WANT one. Custom templates can run anywhere from $200 to $450 and up, but the ones that we have seen have typically run around $350 to $400.
A custom template should include:
1. A custom banner or image
2. Preferably match the look and feel of your website
3. Should for sure include links back to your main website
4. Include easy subscription options for readers for email or RSS
Why not use a free template?
If you are HTML savvy you can certainly download any number of free templates and tweak them. Remember a blog template for Blogspot will contain different programming syntax than will a template for custom FTP or old Blogger. WordPress templates will have unique syntax and will not be compatible with the Blogger platform.
A lot of whether you will purchase a custom template will depend on your budget. If you are buying blog writing services, it seems crazy to spend that much money for content and have a “plain vanilla” blog template that clearly says to the world “I am tentative on this blogging thing”.
Custom blog templates can really enhance the professional appearance of your blog. Now’s the time for you to consider one.
SEO “Snake Oil”
You know what snake oil was, it was a 1920’s patent medicine that supposedly offered miracle cures and was frequently sold at exorbitant prices. Now, we have the FDA to protect us, but the very idea of “snake oil” has moved into the search engine optimization market.
If you don’t think that there are companies selling supposedly miracle traffic generation schemes, think again! Then, there are other firms that simply persuade buyers to pay for services that may provide questionable results. Here are just two of the tactics that I have seen in just the last month alone.
1. Doorway pages created by a firm in India for traffic generation. When confronted with the technique, the firm stated that it was a rogue programmer who had installed them and that they were not providing the service knowingly. There were over 100 doorway pages on the client’s server and each page had clearly taken hours upon hours to create. Do I believe that this was an oversight? No, it clearly was a thought out and comprehensive plan.
2. Directory pages supposedly for link exchanges created by a service firm located in Baltimore, Maryland. On closer look the pages content content with fake anchor text. The <a name> tag contained stuffed keywords and the keyword dense visible links went no where on the site or the web. Clearly an effort on the firms part to build bogus keyword density by using important anchor tags. When challenged on the validity of this approach the SEO “expert” said we are leaving those links as in the future we may actually find someone to link to.
When it comes to organic placement and search engine optimization, there is simply no replacement for great content, clean source code, and hard work. There is no “silver bullet” to get site traffic. Some of the tactics that we have seen implemented just this month may actually penalize you and not help you. Buyer Be Ware!
SEO Snake Oil
Nancy’s post for today is at Design-World Watch and is about two SEO tactics that she has just seen this month.