SEO: Search Engine Optimization Bible (Paperback)

by Jerri Ledford (Author)
Key Phrases: bad site, similar pages, secondary search engines, Google Analytics, Short Staff Closed, Optimizing Search Strategies (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

• This in-depth Bible delivers the holy grail of online marketing: how to influence search engine results to drive online shoppers to specific Web sites; the process is called search engine optimization (SEO) and it is a hot topic
• One-stop resource offers readers what they need to plan and implement a successful SEO program, including useful tips on finding the shortest routes to success, strategy suggestions, and sidebars with more information and additional resources
• Features interviews with executives from top search companies, plus appendices on creating successful listings with Google, MSN, Yahoo!, and others
• Topics include creating an SEO plan; managing keywords; maximizing pay-per-click strategies; understanding the role of links and linking; robots, spiders, and crawlers; maintaining SEO; analyzing success rates; and much more

From the Back Cover
Increase your web traffic with better search results

Wonder how some companies pop up high in search engine rankings? It's all about search appeal. Master the strategies, techniques, and shortcuts in this detailed SEO guide and you can improve your web site's search rankings and start driving the targeted traffic you want to your virtual door. Learn to punch up keywords, add HTML tags for tracking, evaluate pay-per-click strategies, and much more. If you want to make SEO work for you, this is the book you need to succeed.

• Learn how to give your web site search appeal

• Target behaviors and draw the customers you really want

• Employ social media in your search engine marketing

• Optimize your site specifically for Google®, MSN®, or Yahoo!®

• Demystify the role of links and linking in search

• Understand robots, spiders, and crawlers

• Analyze your SEO efforts and see what works

• Make use of SEO tools available online

• Create a winning SEO plan

• Read interviews with over a dozen SEO experts

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Product Details

• Paperback: 408 pages
• Publisher: Wiley (December 17, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470175001
• ISBN-13: 978-0470175002
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 7.4 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #344,442 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Just the same old..., April 20, 2008

By	J. S. Robinson "seo junkie" (Fremont, CA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book should be titled "SEM Overview with some SEO sprinkled in".

It contains misinformation, misconceptions, and myths (particularly on CMS and dynamic sites that use query strings). There about 40-50 pages in this book that are worth reading in regards to SEO, and misses out on a lot more. SEM gets a lot of pages (how to run a PPC campaign) and the rest is fluff.

What's missing? To start: no recommendations on real SEO implementation, just that you should do things. Sure, you should write a good Title tag and Meta Description, but how long should they be? What density of keywords? Should you try to get more than one keyword in a Title tag?

Inbound links section is woefully short, 10 pages of real content, 2 pages covering directories, and the directories to submit to is a list five entries long. There are many more that count than these five.

Following the steps in this book can certainly get a site headed in the right direction, but if your market is already competitive in terms of SEO, this is just the tip of the iceberg, and it doesn't really give a structure for understanding how much work is involved (there is a lot of it) or how long it will really take.

All in all, you can get all this and much much more from just a few web sites. If you feel you need to read it on paper, then print the sites out.

23 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Long on Words -- Short on Expertise, May 13, 2008

By	Inius Mella (Beach, North Dakota) - See all my reviews

The first thing you should read in this book is the author's bio on the back cover. You'll discover that her expertise is freelance business writing, not SEO. That will go a long way in explaining why her book just skims the surface of this complex subject and will provide you with precious little information you can actually use. This book has lots of words, but very little expertise and no depth.

Her discussion of meta tags, title tags, and meta name descriptions, for example, goes no further than explaining what a meta tag looks like. She writes, "Such a tag for the search engine optimization page might look like this:" She then shows us an example...and then moves on to other subjects. There is no in-depth discussion of how to write these critically important tags, how to use or not use keywords or keyword phrases in these tags, no discusses relating to keyword denisty or character length in meta tags or practical example of how sucessful meta tags are written. All you'll be given is an example of what a meta tag looks like. And that's why this book can be described in one word -- shallow.

If you need a bigger clue, this "expert" in SEO has not created any website or blog for her book. Try Googling "SEO Bible" and see what you get. It won't be her book. Sure, there's a page ranking compliments of Amazon.com. But that wasn't her doing. She hasn't even created anything TO optimize. This person probably knows a lot about research and writing -- but knows very little about SEO. Don't be sucked in by the title. This book is not worth it.

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Pretty Good...and Current, December 13, 2007

By	Dan Ball "dbmasters" (Minnesota) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Pretty typical SEO book on the whole, same old advice...meta tags, content keywords, linking in and out and all that. In addition, however, this covers the relatively new concepts of using social media for SEO and promotion as well as the sometimes controversial viral marketing.