Articles on Organic Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

You’ve written your content, you’ve got a website, and you’ve got services, products, or programs to sell … but you’ve got a problem. No one knows you exist or at least not very many people do. And people can’t hire you, buy from you, or learn from you if they don’t know you and can’t find you.

You need to get people to your website A LOT of people and the first step is optimizing your website so you get found online by the people who are not only searching for and desperately in need what you offer, but are ready to buy.

Below you’ll find a collection of articles on organic search engine optimization (SEO) and the information you need to get found more often online and increase your search engine page rank

Genesis SEO Settings Guide

March 13, 2013 | By Brian Bourn | 29 Comments

At Bourn Creative, we build our custom designed WordPress websites exclusively on the Genesis Framework by StudioPress.

The reasons behind our choice to develop our custom themes on the Genesis Framework are numerous, but a few we often highlight are that the Genesis Framework is very flexible/customizable, coded extremely well, and has been built with SEO as a priority (SEO — the art and science of being found online through organic search).

After all, a beautifully designed website means nothing if consumers and search engines can’t find you.

Genesis already has most SEO requirements built into the framework. As a result, a separate WordPress SEO plugin isn’t necessary, which means one less plugin to manage, and keep updated.

Get Our Genesis SEO Settings Guide & Instructions

Filed Under: Blogging & Blog Strategy, Search Engine Optimization, Website Design Tips & Strategy, WordPress Tips & Resources | Tagged With: Custom Genesis Child Theme, Genesis Framework, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, StudioPress, WordPress, WordPress SEO

Adding Google Authorship To Your WordPress Site

March 1, 2013 | By Jennifer Bourn | 29 Comments

(AKA: Getting Your Photo To Show Up In The Google Search Results)

Google Search Results Page Showing Author Photo

Facial recognition is a powerful marketing tool and authors, business owners, and bloggers alike are taking advantage of it.

When searching Google, you have more than likely noticed that photos are now appearing next to some of the listed search results on the search engine results pages — and you may have even been influenced by those photos when deciding which link to click.

Getting YOUR Photo to Show Up

Adding your photo to Google’s search results can easily be accomplished in a few different ways with a WordPress site. In fact, the process is nearly identical using three of our favorite WordPress tools:

Learn How to get your photo to show up next to your pages and posts in the Google search results

Filed Under: Blogging & Blog Strategy, Client Attraction, Marketing Tips & Marketing Strategy, Search Engine Optimization, Website Design Tips & Strategy, WordPress Tips & Resources | Tagged With: Genesis Framework, Google Authorship, Search Engine Optimization, Search Engine Results Page, SEO, WordPress, WordPress SEO

WordPress Now Supports HTML In Image Captions

June 20, 2012 | By Brian Bourn | Leave a Comment

Last week WordPress 3.4 was released as a major update that included many new features for users and developers.

One of my favorite new features included in version 3.4 is the ability to add HTML to WordPress image captions. Image captions have been available for quite a while in WordPress but they did not support any HTML elements.

A few plugins have been released to add this functionality, but now they are no longer necessary. I love using well created plugins but love it even more when new functionality is added to WordPress eliminating the need for one.

Learn How To Add Image Captions & HTML To Image Captions To WordPress Images

Filed Under: Blogging & Blog Strategy, Search Engine Optimization, WordPress Tips & Resources | Tagged With: Image Captions, WordPress Plugins, WordPress Tips

11 Ways to Optimize Blog Posts And Get More Website Traffic

September 26, 2011 | By Jennifer Bourn | 10 Comments

Even the most seasoned bloggers can forget an important step when publishing a new blog post.

And forgetting a step usually means a lost opportunity to optimize your post for the search engines, to get found by your ideal clients online, and to attract new readers to your website.

Use this blog post optimization checklist each time you publish a new post to ensure that it is ready to attract visitors, and optimized to improve your search engine rankings.

Learn the 11 Ways to Optimize a Blog Post

Filed Under: Search Engine Optimization | Tagged With: Blog Post Optimization, More Website Traffic, Optimize Blog Posts, Search Engine Optimization, SEO

Using Internal Links for Search Engine Optimization

April 28, 2011 | By Jennifer Bourn | 4 Comments

Links on your website to other pages on your website are known as internal links, meaning all traffic stays on your website.

The internal links on your website, and more important, the words used in the internal links are a very important part of your organic search engine optimization efforts and can make a big difference!

Here is a quick guide to maximizing the click-throughs and effectiveness of your internal website links:

Learn How to Optimize Your Internal Website Links

Filed Under: Search Engine Optimization | Tagged With: Internal Links, Link Titles, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, Text Links

The Real Story About Inbound, Outbound, and Internal Website Links

April 3, 2011 | By Jennifer Bourn | 1 Comment

Online marketing and search engine optimization consultants talk A LOT about website links and why you need to pay attention to them and optimize them.

But while they talk a lot, and blog a lot, and write a lot, they use a lot of jargon and technical speak that can be really hard to understand if you’re new to link building and link optimization.

Today, I’m sharing with you the real story about inbound links, outbound links, and internal links, why you need them, what they do for you, and how they are different.

Filed Under: Search Engine Optimization | Tagged With: Anchor Text, Inbound Links, Internal Links, Link Building, Link Optimization, Outbound Links, Search Engine Listings

Planning a Successful Small Business Website

March 18, 2011 | By Jennifer Bourn | 3 Comments

Often when we start working with a new client, they are anxious to get their site up quickly and want to jump into the website design process and get started right away.

But design isn’t the first step in the process of creating a successful small business website. Before we get started on the design of any client site, we first need to work with our clients to plan the site.

Planning a small business website or a small business blog can be a daunting task, but it will make a huge difference in your conversion rates, sales, and results you see from the site.

Here is a list of things you need to take into consideration and plan for before you get started on the design of your website:

Filed Under: Search Engine Optimization, Website Design Tips & Strategy | Tagged With: Planning a Website, Small Business Website, Website Design Tips & Strategy, Website Footer, Website Organization, Website Planning, Website Sidebar

Why You Need to Know About Google’s Blog Search Engine

March 16, 2011 | By Jennifer Bourn | Leave a Comment

Did you know that Google has a segmented search engine just for searching blogs and blog content?

That’s right! There is a blog search engine. Cool right?

Here’s the link: http://blogsearch.google.com/

Why should you as an entrepreneur or business owner care about Google’s Blog Search Engine?

That’s easy!

Bloggers are the new wave of trusted, authentic media, and they have a huge impact on journalism, sales, consumer thought, and communications.

Google’s blog search engine will help you if:

How to Use Google Places Even if You Are a Virtual Business

December 20, 2010 | By Jennifer Bourn | 3 Comments

Have you ever been searching for directions with Google Maps and seen a business listing come up in the results?

The businesses that appear are taking advantage of a free service from Google called Google Places (Formerly Google Local).

Any business – even a virtual business can create a Google Places business profile that includes customer reviews, special offers or coupons, hours of operation, videos (up to 5) and more.