SEO: image optimization with Shrink-O-Matic

Image opti­miza­tion is an SEO fac­tor. Google has stated in their Web­mas­ter Guide­lines that web­sites should be opti­mized to load quickly:

Mon­i­tor your site’s per­for­mance and opti­mize load times. Google’s goal is to give users with the most rel­e­vant results and a great user expe­ri­ence. Fast sites increase user sat­is­fac­tion and improve the over­all qual­ity of the web (espe­cially for those users with slow Inter­net con­nec­tions), and we hope that as web­mas­ters improve their sites, the over­all speed of the web will improve.

Shrink-O-Matic is a free (dona­tion) tool that can help with image opti­miza­tion. This is a very handy tool for resiz­ing images in bulk.  As part of this process it strips out unnec­es­sary infor­ma­tion result­ing in ‘lighter’ file sizes. The images aren’t as light as pos­si­ble, but gen­er­ally much improved.  The ease of use of this tool makes it ideal for bulk image opti­miz­ing.  Add resiz­ing, renam­ing, and water­mark­ing to the mix and you have a winner.

Shrink-O-Matic as an Adobe Air appli­ca­tion so it should work on all plat­forms, as long as you have Air installed. If you find it use­ful I encour­age you to make a dona­tion to sup­port author Quentin Thi­au­court’s work.

Get Shrink-O-Matic

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SEO and expired content

Prop­erly deal­ing with expired con­tent is impor­tant. I have a few clients who reg­u­larly update their web­site and remove con­tent that is dated or obso­lete.  Usu­ally I notice the con­tent is miss­ing and send them an email along the lines of “never remove con­tent!” along with some expla­na­tion. But is just keeps hap­pen­ing, and it is hurt­ing their vis­i­tors expe­ri­ence and their web­site’s search engine ranking.

The con­cern with remov­ing expired con­tent, or not remov­ing it, is that  vis­i­tors will con­tinue to come to your web­site, directed by search engines and out­side links, and will not find what they are look­ing for.  Either what they wanted is miss­ing, or it is old and out of date.  You have just made a bad impres­sion.  Fur­ther, search engines are in the busi­ness of direct­ing vis­i­tors to use­ful con­tent.  If they detect that send­ing vis­i­tors your way isn’t help­ful they will rank you lower in their search results.  Search engines want the pages and con­tent they think you have to be sta­ble and reli­able. So what to do? (more…)

SEO Directory Submission Targets

SEO pro­mo­tion of your web­site must con­sider both fac­tors inside your web­site, the design of your web­site, and out­side on web­sites that refer to you.  Search engines will look at where your web­site exists in the inter­net — who is link­ing to you and how rep­utable are they.  These are called back-links.

Good qual­ity back-links require a lit­tle work, but are worth­while.  One source for back-links are web­site direc­to­ries.  They will list your web­site and a descrip­tion.  There are bet­ter types of back-links, but direc­to­ries are cheap (free) and easy.  You do, how­ever, need a lot of them. There are ser­vices that can sub­mit your site auto­mat­i­cally for a fee, and you can also pay these direc­to­ries to pri­or­i­tize your list­ing.  Just be ready with your web­site’s address, title, and description.

This VERY long list has more direc­to­ries than you could ever need.  PR refers to PageR­ank and is a mea­sure of the direc­to­ries reputation.

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4 Reasons Your Website Fails To Convert

Web Design Digest lists 4 rea­sons your great look­ing web­site isn’t gen­er­at­ing any heat — tar­geted land­ing pages, clear call-to-action, direct home­page, and per­sonal connection.

Top 4 Rea­sons Your Beau­ti­ful Web­site Doesn’t Convert