Is optimizing just a waste of time?

[simonbg]

I have had a website for about 18 months now - www.sitgesaccommodation.com - that consistently ranks about 70 for the phrase "sitges apartments" on Google.

I have put a huge amount of effort into keyword analysis, getting backlinks (I have about 200, though "link:" only reports 3) and so forth, but it has made only a slight improvement to this ranking.

The other day, just for fun, I set up www.sitgesapartments.info that consists of just a single page. The instant Google found it, it indexed it around 75 - just a few places below the one I spent all that time optimizing.

Did I just waste all that time for nothing?

[buddhu]

No, man. You're not wasting your time, you just need to try some more stuff. This is a trial and error thing.

A few suggestions (I've not had time to look at your site in-depth, so excuse me if you already do some of these):

* Build a site map. Even if you use plain text links a sitemap gives you somewhere else where you can link to each page using that pages keywords as the anchor text.
* Try moving the H1 heading above the H2. The H1 is the one with your keywords. I was once told that as Hx tags are designed to be a hierarchy that SEs expect to see H1 first.
* Optimise for one or two phrases per page only, and make them keyphrases, not individual words. Your keyword metas on the pages I've viewed source seem to have a lot of keywords - many of them single words.
* Choose keyphrases that will be useful. Having just "reservations" as a keyword probably won't do much for you. Have you researched which terms people are searching on?
* Use those keyphrases in your link anchor text. If that doesn't look right in your main nav then do it in your body content and the sitemap.
* At the moment, for example, you link to your reservations page using just that word as anchor. Why not use "sitges apartments reservations"?
* Also, if it's "sitges apartments" you want to optimise your homepage for then maybe you should have that exact phrase in your title. At the moment it says "Sitges Vacation Apartment for Holiday Rental".
* Try to ensure that as many of your backlinks as possible use variations on your keyphrases as anchor text, and that they point to the page that is optimised for that anchor text phrase.

There still seems to be scope for tweaks to your site. Just keep working on refining your on-page factors and building those inbound links. I'd bet you'll see progress. Maybe not as fast as you'd like, but the work does pay off. That's a fact, and it's the fact that satisfies my conscience that the work I do does make a difference to our site's perfomance.

Good luck.

[glengara]

*Did I just waste all that time for nothing?*

I think your on-page stuff is OK, a doctype might be an idea, but it's the off-page stuff you're lacking, particularly links with your KWs in the anchor text.

*I have about 200, though "link:" only reports 3*

Y! only shows 19, and displays only 9.

[sudhani]

No - If you are looking for instant returns. Don't understand your market well.

YES - For long term benefits. Know how to do it right.

[lbutton]

Hello I read your posting and went to your website There are two things to be fixed on your web site
# 1 I have no idea where in the world the location is ??? no city street address what country ??
it just says vacation accomidation could you be more general than that
#2 <TITLE>Sitges Vacation Apartment for Holiday Rental</TITLE>
"way to general and in capitals"
should be
<TITLE>sitges spain apartments rentals accomodations.</TITLE>

also in the body refer to Spain

[simonbg]

Thanks to all of you for taking the time to look at my site and make suggestions! Especially to buddhu for so many great ideas. I will certainly follow up on all of them.

One of the issues for me is that my site is about a single apartment, yet I am aware that most people search in plural (they search for "apartments" rather than "apartment"). So it's difficult to balance catching those searches versus not wanting to confuse visitors.

[webmasterjunkie]

Optimizing is in no way a waste of time. I have done my own optimizing of my site and am fairing well. It is definately a trial and error. Just keep trying and don't give up when you err.

[mushroom]

Optimizing also means making your home page load as fast as posible, your annimated gif all though very nice dose very little to the over all look and adds many seconds to the down load time for a dialup user.

[sfowler]

In my opinion you are not being general enough. Try adding Barcelona, Catalonia, Mediterranean etc. People are much more likely to search for things like that.

[tcampione]

Originally Posted by simonbg

The instant Google found it, it indexed it around 75 - just a few places below the one I spent all that time optimizing.

See where this one page ends up after 4 or 5 months. If it's not optimized, it is very likely to fall way down in SERPs.

[astro]

1. You are in a very, very competitive market, I think you need to re-evaluate your design aspect.

Meta tags a touch repetitive and way to much......in fact I suggest you delete most of them, just leave the page and site title, W3C don't count for much it seems these days either!

<META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="Sitges apartments,apartments Sitges,Sitges,apartment,apartments,apartments for rent,Sitges apartments for rent,holiday flat,holiday accommodation,holiday,rent,rental,rentals,accommod ation,flat,vacation">

Not good!!!!! delete! If I was looking for a flat in Spain, would I think of keying in " apartment+Sitges"??? Or would I key in "flat in Spain + sea view" or some such similar?

Thought about "owners direct" or other sites offering rental listings? A lot less hassle for a single apartment! Some providers of this type of service allow you to link the listing to your now sparkling new much simplified web site!

As some one in your line of business with 73 apartments and villas for rent, I can empathise with your disappointment in SEO, but you are not playing on a level playing field to start with.

/astro

[TrafficProducer]

Catch 22, to optimize you need traffic, to get traffic you need to optimize

[Feydakin]

Did you two just reply to a 5 year old thread?? Really??

[LoanShark]

Thanks Feydakin! I was really starting to do some research for this thread until I read your post. What a waste of time.

[astro]

Oops! for some reason it was on my profile page?????? so I clicked on it! Never looked at the date

Astro

[newyorkshopping]

Buddhu gave you useful information, may be it's about your site (metas, may be you are penalized...)
You should follow his advice.

[thefandango]

Amazingly despite it being 5 years out of date, and a 5 years where people have read all over the net about meta tags not effecting rank anymore, the latest reply is about meta tags. Just goes to show that you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink!

Originally Posted by newyorkshopping

Buddhu gave you useful information, may be it's about your site (metas, may be you are penalized...)
You should follow his advice.

[shakir]

Originally Posted by astro

1. You are in a very, very competitive market, I think you need to re-evaluate your design aspect.

Meta tags a touch repetitive and way to much......in fact I suggest you delete most of them, just leave the page and site title, W3C don't count for much it seems these days either!



Not good!!!!! delete! If I was looking for a flat in Spain, would I think of keying in " apartment+Sitges"??? Or would I key in "flat in Spain + sea view" or some such similar?

Thought about "owners direct" or other sites offering rental listings? A lot less hassle for a single apartment! Some providers of this type of service allow you to link the listing to your now sparkling new much simplified web site!

As some one in your line of business with 73 apartments and villas for rent, I can empathise with your disappointment in SEO, but you are not playing on a level playing field to start with.

/astro

How u got the thread.. its too old.. u did not check it before replay... any how its not a good habit

[PaulSymonds]

SEO works provided you have a clear strategy and do it right. Make sure to carefully consider the link text for example, sort the keyword desnity and meta tags etc.

The pages which get high positions immediately are often places and then move after a few months to their natural position - dependant on many things.

Do not give up! There are some great ideas and tonnes of info on this forum if you want to retry SEOing your main site.

[seoconsult1]

Its not waste the time. As i analyze that you lack in off page and also some error in On page.

So i suggest you that do more quality work to get some links and improve your keywords density and prominence.

2nd Try to avoid unethical work and rotate anchor text frequently. Because if you try to get each link from same anchor text then after some time its stop to improve.

[deepsand]

Originally Posted by shakir

How u got the thread.. its too old.. u did not check it before replay... any how its not a good habit

Are you saying that, by definition, "old" is "useless?"

If not, how is one to know before one looks at it?

And, if one looks and finds it to be useful, should one then presume that no other will later do likewise?

And, if one then allow that others will view it and find it useful, must it be the case that no additional comment should be made?

[TrafficProducer]

Originally Posted by deepsand

Are you saying that, by definition, "old" is "useless?"

If not, how is one to know before one looks at it?

And, if one looks and finds it to be useful, should one then presume that no other will later do likewise?

And, if one then allow that others will view it and find it useful, must it be the case that no additional comment should be made?

I agree

"old" is not "useless?"

If fact posts like this can turn-out to be very useful.... Even though SEO, search engines, Internet use, hardware/software change at an alaming rate

Some newbies do not carry out any optimizing at all so this not-optimizing could be the just a waste of time?