could my site be lacking something important, or could it just SUCK?

topspinsports · #1 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 09:23 AM

I am noticing that I can barely get any traffic through search engines. I have pretty good content and was wondering if there is something that search engines are valuing in their organic rankings that I do not have in my site.

The reason I ask this is because until last week I did not even have a !doc type in my pages. There are many things that may be obvious to other people that I may just not know in terms of SEO. I am not a programmer or designer, therefore I am ln need of help.

Is there anything my site is missing or not doing correctly to get more traffic from organic searches. The site has been up for about 5 months.

Steve

Tennis Lessons, Videos, and Tips from Pros

Dubbya · #2 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 09:46 AM

How about a link so that someone can evaluate where your site might need some work?

topspinsports · #3 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 10:04 AM

haha nice....

so sorry

Tennis Lessons, Videos, and Tips from Pros

kgun · #4 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 10:22 AM

What does that mean?

Top Spin Sports?

If yes, is soccer a spin sport?

thorfjalar · #5 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 03:37 PM

I was going to say

that your site lacks only age (especially considering the copmpetition of tennis related websites online), the only thing that can not be tweaked by SEO experts (or?). But hang in there, after a month at least the domain name will be a year old according to whois.sc, ...

but then I see that archive.org archived it March 3rd 2006, strange.

Anyway, the only clue I can suggest are the frequent IP changes, 12 in a year, maybe you should buy your own IP, or is that yesterdays SEO?

Dubbya · #6 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 04:29 PM

Looks like you're dressed for success in terms of layout and content.

There are a few issues that you may wish to address.

Missing <h1> headings. (Each page should have a heading.)
Meta description is too long. (keep it between 160-200 characters max.)
Place your style sheets in an external file and link to them.
Similarly, remove repetitive javaScript, place it in an external file and link to it.
Google is filtering out all of your links. Try to gain links from related, established and quality sites.

Fitz · #7 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 04:40 PM

Dubbya has it dead right.
.... But a couple of other small details:

h2's are good too.... possibly more so than they used to be.

Also, put your <title> tag first in the <head> section - it's presently way down the list and historically, s/engines like it first - next line under the opening <head> line.

Add a robots.txt file.

Add a robots <meta> tag (index,follow)

**incrediblehelp** · #8 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 05:10 PM

Why not add a Daily Tennis Tip Blog?

janeth · #9 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 07:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by thorfjalar

I was going to say

that your site lacks only age (especially considering the copmpetition of tennis related websites online), the only thing that can not be tweaked by SEO experts (or?).

There are ways around it.

janeth · #10 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 08:10 PM

Add a blog like incrediblehelp said or add more content targeting less competitive keywords.

edhan · #11 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 09:54 PM

You may try submitting articles to article directories with links back to your site. Participation in forums, press release, etc will help to bring in traffic. You need to promote after building a site otherwise there will not be any traffic.

kronikmedia · #12 (**permalink**) 06-09-2008, 10:37 PM

I agree with Edhan. You will need to concentrate on building links to your website. Article distribution and press releases can be an excellent way to get many links form fairly reputed sites. Our main web design company website is also less than a year old. However we have worked actively on search engine optimisation for the website for the past 7 months and it has started to work for us only recently. Patience is key. I had thought of giving up many times in the last year when I failed to get the desired results on search engines in spite of putting in a good few hours of manual search engine optimisation tasks daily.

However over the last few months we have seen our traffic grow. Our domain is still less than a year old and we receive about 700 visits per month. I know this is nothing compared to most websites but we offer a business to business service i.e web design and web development so we do not expect to get tens of thousands of hits. Even with the current level of website traffic we are able to generate a few enquiries for web design or software development every month with about 2 conversion rates per months. Getting even 2 or 3 projects a month purely as a result of our search engine optimisation efforts works for us in the time being while we continue optimisation and hope for the visit to rise further. I think the key to our gradual improvement has largely been due to the following main factors:

- Regular new content on our website.
- Regular Press Releases.
- And more recently Article distribution.

Fitz · #13 (**permalink**) 06-10-2008, 05:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by janeth

There are ways around it.

Can you please expand upon that Janeth?
Or should that be a separate thread?!

Thanks.

janeth · #14 (**permalink**) 06-10-2008, 12:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fitz

Can you please expand upon that Janeth?
Or should that be a separate thread?!

Thanks.

Might be better to start another thread.

Fitz · #15 (**permalink**) 06-10-2008, 02:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by janeth

Might be better to start another thread.

OK .... good idea .... here it is:
Overcoming ranking limitations of a 'young' domain

Martinscholes · #16 (**permalink**) 06-11-2008, 08:43 PM

I found your site on google.

I did a search for Coach Kyril. His own site came up first and several others with him on it, then yours.

The adverts on the site seem a little odd. Nothing relating to tennis, there's a house makeover game, though. Why? If your adverts reflect your content, it might help make it look relevant to visitors. An advert for a house makeover game doesn't do this, IMO. Nor does the other advert that comes up in the UK, at least, for BUPA, a private health care firm.

Tennis racquets, tennis balls, nets, supplies, etc., would be better, I feel.

advancedmerchant · #17 (**permalink**) 06-15-2008, 12:49 PM

First, I agree with Dubbya. Get that done first.
Second, you have WAY too much real estate for ads right now. An older established site can get away with it, but a new site needs more CONTENT.

I would lose the ads for now (since you have little traffic, you are not making revenue anyway), devote the space to content, and build up the traffic. Once you have traffic, ad ad space sparingly and slowly, watching your traffic carefully.

janeth · #18 (**permalink**) 06-15-2008, 03:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by advancedmerchant

First, I agree with Dubbya. Get that done first.
Second, you have WAY too much real estate for ads right now. An older established site can get away with it, but a new site needs more CONTENT.

I would lose the ads for now (since you have little traffic, you are not making revenue anyway), devote the space to content, and build up the traffic. Once you have traffic, ad ad space sparingly and slowly, watching your traffic carefully.

How many unique visitors per day would you consider being enough to start running ads on a site?

tombstoneweb · #19 (**permalink**) 06-30-2008, 09:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by edhan

You may try submitting articles to article directories with links back to your site. Participation in forums, press release, etc will help to bring in traffic. You need to promote after building a site otherwise there will not be any traffic.

Hi edhan. Where would we be able to find article directories that take submissions? I wasn't even aware they existed.

Thanks.

topspinsports · #20 (**permalink**) 06-30-2008, 09:37 AM

For some reason I never recieved an e-mail telling me people wrote back to this thread...so I am a little late getting back, but

THANK YOU ALL!!!!

Seriously a big help. I wont give up. I am currently redesigning the site for more appeal.

This is the new layout. Hope it looks decent.

Tennis Videos

edhan · #21 (**permalink**) 06-30-2008, 09:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tombstoneweb

Hi edhan. Where would we be able to find article directories that take submissions? I wasn't even aware they existed.

Thanks.

My article directory is still opened for members. Not sure about others though.