Google AdWords Quality Score Explained in Simple Words

*The following tip was shared by Eric Gesinski who does Tulsa SEO and PPC work*

A major part of Google AdWords that should be paid attention to is the Quality Score. This is a ranking between 1 and 10, 1 being worst, 10 being best. It’s not on by default in the settings. To have it show in
your AdWords display, inside your keywords tab go to “Filters and views” and select “Customize columns”. From here put a check in the box next to “Qual. Score”. This will show your QS (Quality Score) for each keyword.

In AdWords, Google scores each keyword separately for QS. The score you have will affect your CPC and position for each keyword. A low score can multiply your CPC for your keywords by several times, so it is good to try to target high QS for your keywords.

To get a high QS, you should make sure your keywords match with the ad you are using for them as well as the landing page that ad is pointing to. If this means you have to break your keywords into more ad groups,
then that would be a recommended approach. Google scores the QS based on relevance, so keeping your keywords matching the ad matching the landing page will help increase your Quality Score.

In addition to this relevance, Google will also adjust your QS based on your CTR. If you have a higher one it will help raise your QS further. And of course, if you have a low CTR, it will tend to drop your QS.

If you do all of the above and keep your keyword, ad, and landing page related to each other as well as have an ad with a good CTR, you can sometimes land a QS of 10, which will have you paying much less per
click and often allow you a position above the organic listings without having to pay as much as other advertisers who have ads in the side listings. For all of these reasons, Quality Score is an element of
AdWords that should not be ignored.

Get Only Relevant Traffic from Image Search: Block Non-Content Images

From : www.dailyseotip.com

More and more people are searching for images over the Internet. This results into tons of untargeted traffic that means more spam, more pain for servers and no benefit at all.

The thing is most popular search engines (including Google) is text-based. It won’t know that your image is about flowers if you call it apple.jpg, use “apple” in the alt text or just tell something about apples in the text located near the image.

Therefore there are still so many confusing images in Google search results.

But there’s a good solution to make Google’s image search bot’s job easier: this tip was mentioned in the recent Vanessa Fox’s post on image optimization:

It is recommended to block non-content images (purely descriptive) for two reasons:

• To exclude them from search results;
• To save crawler’s time that will discover something useful instead of that.

To block non-content images you should:

Place them in a separate folder from your content images
Block that folder using robots.txt.
For instance, if you place these images in a folder called no_index_images, your robots.txt file would contain:

User-agent:*

Disallow:/no_index_images

The SEO's Toolkit

Part One of Three: Firefox

By Dave Davies (c) 2009

Every SEO uses different tools and resources. Some tools are paid, some are free and some are internally developed tools that we use for ourselves and our clients - but we all use them. Very often I get asked what tools people should use if they're looking to optimize their own sites and what resources they should use to keep up with the latest going's on. While telling people how to optimize their own sites and what the tools we use isn't generally the best of business practices - I just can't help myself. If your budget doesn't allow for the hiring of a professional SEO company - trying it yourself may be the only option. I also try to remember that once-upon-a-time I was optimizing my own sites and was new to SEO and without the open advice of others already involved in the community - I wouldn't be running a successful SEO company today. To this end, it only seems right to provide a list of some of the main tools we use on virtually every site.

When I initially started writing this article I was going to cram a slew of various tools and resources into one article, but the article was going to end up running WAY too long to hold your attention (or mine) so I've cut it into three EZ parts (as opposed to three EZ payments which you'll be familiar with if you too watch late night TV with a laptop in front of you writing things like SEO articles). But let's get to the meat of this article shall we? The series will be divided into three parts:

• Firefox
• Free & Affordable Tools
• Resources

So let's begin with Firefox. Let me first say, I don't know if Firefox is officially the browser of SEO's, but if not - it should be. You can download it at Mozilla.com. And now the extensions that make this browser invaluable to SEO's ...

SEO Quake

If I had to lose all but one of my SEO tools - this would be the one I'd keep which is why it gets listed first. This little tool allows me to quickly look at the top 10 results in the SERPs and within seconds see all the PageRank, indexed page numbers, backlinks to that page, domain backlinks, the age of the site and much, much more.

This tool doesn't provide any revolutionary information in that it's all data that can be accessed directly. However, it reduces the time taken for tasks that would take minutes to seconds. It then provides easy links to more detailed information. A fantastic tool.

Oh, and it also adds a line through all nofollowed links. Very handy when link building.

SEO for Firefox

Aaron Wall over at SEO Book has added a great tool to the mix that duplicates a lot of functions of SEO Quake but which has enough additional features to be very useful. Basically - neither is a replacement for the other.

Like most tools - it provides information that can be accessed in other ways, BUT with this Tool Aaron allows users to find tons of relevant site and keyword information quickly and painlessly. From keyword traffic to keyword trends, from backlink counts to social media mentions - this tools gives quick access to tons of information.

Admittedly, I prefer the layout of SEO Quake and some of the easier functionality.

SEO Link Analysis

A HUGE thumbs way up (two of them in fact) to Joost de Valk who made all our lives simpler when this tool launched. What this tool does is display the PageRank and anchor text of every link when you perform a backlink check on one of the major engines. I suppose you could visit every single site and get this information yourself and there's value in that to be sure, but when you need a quick analysis of a site's backlinks - this tool is invaluable.

As a sidenote – it works VERY well with SEO Quake.

Web Developer

With this tool we're getting a bit more advanced. For those of you who understand coding or are learning (and you should be), this tool is incredible. It allows for quick testing and viewing of a site's structure including, image info, table and cell information, W3C compliance, CSS details and MUCH, MUCH more.

I can't possibly list off all the functions this tool offers and admittedly I don't use them all but I use enough of them regularly for this tool to make my top 10 list.

IE Tab

This is an odd tool to add and it's purely a convenience tool but like adding a second monitor to your system - once you have it and realize that it saves you just a few seconds dozens of times per day you quickly realize that your productivity relies on it.

With a simple click of a button, this tool loads Internet Explorer into your Firefox tab so you don't have to go back-and-forth between browsers when testing. I could survive without it, but since you have Firefox anyways...

Search Status

This is another tool with many uses. On the surface it simply displays PageRank, Alexa and Compete rank and mozRank data but with a right-click of the icon you get access to a whole slew of additional information, including fast links to whois, the robots and sitemap files, keyword density information, Archive.org info, and it will even highlight nofollow links.

A lot of these features overlap other tools noted above, but I will say - I have it installed and so should you.

These are the main extensions I have installed for Firefox (read: the ones I use virtually every day). This isn't to say that's all there are, and I can't stress enough the benefits of visiting addons.mozilla.org and looking for more useful extensions specific to your needs (RSS, Twitter, coding, etc.) I have about a dozen more installed than are listed here, but those above are the main Firefox SEO tools I use daily.

In the next article, we'll be taking a look at free and affordable tools that you can use to help improve your website rankings. Be sure to keep your eyes open as there will be many invaluable tools listed there too.

About The Author
Dave Davies is the CEO for Beanstalk Search Engine Optimization, Inc. Beanstalk offers organic SEO services, consulting, link building and SEO copywriting services. While they provide their SEO from Victoria, BC they are proud to serve the world.

(From SiteProNews.com)