"What we're noticing is that growth in search traffic is much flatter than it usually is after the first month of a new client blog."

Given that you are already seeing less progress than what you are used to I would go ahead and put something else on the Spanish page until the content is translated.

Even better would be not to release the Spanish page until it's ready, is that an option you have?

I speak 5 languages and therefore have the opportunity to do on-page SEO and content writing for 5 different cultures. This question to me has much to do with the way Google translator works. It doesn't, trust me! Which then makes me wonder how the web crawlers, which are designed with English in mind, can fairly and equally attribute the same ranking points to a foreign website.

Since Google seems to use sematic search technology I'm wondering if foreign sites have it easier or not.

Any ideas?

Would it be possible for you to contact the people you bought the links from and have them removed?

Also what is the time frame from when you were on the first page to when you dropped?

I think at this point if this has only happened recently then it's too early to talk about building a new website with a new domain. I would add more positives like good content, social activity and quality links while fighting to remove the bad links.

You're trying to stuff too many keywords on one page, also the H1 tag will not make or break your on-site SEO so don't obsess about having to put your keywords as an h1 header .

Why don't you split the keywords on 2 or 3 different pages and do the following:

Keyword + Catchy heading

I've copy and pasted this from Rand's post of a few weeks ago. This is mainly about the title tag but is also valid for the H1 tag in my opinion

http://www.seomoz.org/blog/6-changes-every-seo-should-make-before-the-over-optimization-penalty-hits-whiteboard-friday

your titles need to be authentic. They need to sound real. They need to sound like a human being wrote them that was not intending necessarily simply to rank for phrase after phrase. I'll give you a good example. Bad: web design services, web design firm space brand name, whatever your brand name is, web design. What does it sound like? It sounds like all you're trying to do is rank for keywords, not show off your brand name, especially if this is your home page or those kinds of things. You're repeating keywords three times. Web design is in this title three times. Think about whether a normal human being would read that title and think, oh yeah, that sounds legitimate. No, they'd think to themselves there's something fishy here, something spammy, something's wrong, something manipulative. Try instead, probably equally effective, if not more, brand name web design Portland Spiffiest Design Services. Now look, I've got the word "design services," which you wanted to get in here. I've got the city where you are that you're trying to target, got brand name web design, right, sort of branding myself as the product and the keyword. Much, much better.

Since you are trying to dominate the first 5 positions because you want people to buy from you I would recommend building a new site from scratch with the following:

• Different domain registrar
• Different hosting company
• Different content
• Different link profile
• Different site design

...you get where I'm going.

I can vouch that having done this for a certain client of mine it is indeed possible to dominate a keyword but you have to pose a competing company.

We did this because we had a client who owned 2 hotels with 2 different names that were right across the street from one another in London. In our case we were also able to register two Google places listings.

I was personally uncomfortable about doing this as room service was provided by the same chamber maids, the food by the same chef and the prices were identical. The only difference was in who manned the reception area and the decoration of the rooms...

If you are currently number 1 for most of your keywords but you feel that some people are buying from your competitors there must be a reason and creating a duplicate of your site won't help even if you have the first 2 pages covered. I would invest my time in finding out why. Could it be the prices, the product itself, delivery options, site structure, the images you use etc?

I would  build the new site, not to trick customers into buying from me, but to learn what their preferences are and then apply them to my main site.

We're active in the Italian market, if you need any pointers let me know

You won't be awarded any PR value if it is not a link, at best someone might copy and paste the text link and visit your site. In that case I woud usually contact the web master and ask to make the text link a proper link.

By achieving target you mean you've already gotten your client to the first page, number 1 spot for his primary keywords? If yes and I were in your position I would track the conversions he is getting at the moment and then focus on related long tail keywords.

The one thing I would do if i were asked to deliver results ASAP with this budget though is to set up a PPC campaign. If your client is already ranking under keywords that are generating business, why not double that presence with sponsored links? (This is one of our most basic strategies and it works beautifully for us)

"And if one was so inclined to build bad backlinks to a competitor it would have a negative effect"

There is a whole branch called Negative SEO specialised in destroying your competitor' SERPS and though you will find loads of sites promoting that they do this in a "Completeley legal" I urge you not to succumb to the temptation of trying it.

The time and money you would spend trying to negatively impact others would be better spent on optimizing your own site, and think about it: If suddenly anyone above you starts dropping in rankings and your site is the only one that ascends don't you think someone is going to wonder why?

You seem to have answered this all by yourself already, reciprocal links and close to useless nowadays and since you do not think you will get any direct traffic from their site I wouldn't bother if I were you.

I see the problem here, were you using the Google Keyword Tool?

If yes then on the left there is a box headed Match Type

You will find a tick near the word Broad

You need to UNtick that and then tick Exact

I've attached an image of what it should look like, hope this helps

MdJCI.png

We favor Wordpress but Joomla is just as good, however the real point that should be made is that if the SEO on and off the site isn't done well you won't rank regardless of which platform you use. Since you're creating a squeeze page, which I guess you will supplement by adding a blog, I would use Wordpress

I'm baffled by this question can you elaborate?

What is your SEO firm asking you $250/hour for? I also cannot imagine what possible value you will get by paying $249 for a life time link on a directory unless it's dmoz.

The fact that your competitors paid the $249 might be an indication that the directory brings traffic that converts but even then I am curious to find out how you know that all your competitors are there? Did a rep from the site call you and tell you that or did you find out for yourself? Ultimately when it comes to SEO, paying for links is a big no no. With more info might be able to give better advice

A few points to make here:

Sandbox: This is not a term I would be using anymore, not since 2005 at the very least. I get the impression you think it is a penalty imposed by Google to new sites but the contrary is actually true. Newly registered domains usually get what I call a 'grace' period were rankings are slightly boosted. After some time if the site is not properly structured, has poor on-page SEO or poor content it will lose this added boost.

Since the difficulty level is 26% I'm going to say that if you create good content for the site and build up a healthy and legitimate link profile you can get it ranked within 6 months pretty easily.

You said this is a local business so you will be using geo targeted keywords, Google places and local social marketing I assume? Although I would recommend not guaranteeing your client that he will be there 100% in 6 months I'm very sure it can be done.

Hi definitely agree with the point you made about marketing. I have always believed that a top notch SEO should have some insight into the workings of marketing in general to better assist a business in making use of the internet to generate sales. I also believe this to be true for PPC managers by the way but more so for SEOs

Here's my two cents. I run two web sites offering the same service, one in the UK and one in Italy. One of the qualities most people remember me by from what I heard (and what I've been told) is my sense of humour.

Last year I decided to incorporate this in my two sites and the results could NOT have been more contradictory. The UK market seemed to respond better to my naming the services and membership statuses in a humorous manner than their italian counterparts. I actually lost two Italian clients because they took offence to having their membership status as 'Principianti' which in essence means newbies.

I want to add that there was no rudeness in the humour employed by either site, I simply did away with any formality.

Result: Perhaps some A/B testing would have been clever in hindsight but ultimately what I lost with this experiment I more than made up for in clients with a sense of humour!

Thanks for your response, would you say that knowledge in link building is already an indicator of an intermediate SEO or would that still be the basics? I personally believe that you cannot even be considered an SEO if all you do is on-page seo but I'd like to know what everyone thinks about this.

Very valid point Alan thanks for the heads up however I feel that the thumbs up system is most useful as an indicator to others who are probably faced with the same question as to which answer is the most appropriate.

I don't consider myself to be an advanced SEO so when I read the responses to certain questions I am not always able to determine which answer is the best one, that's when I look at the number of thumbs up each response has received as it is usually a good indicator.

Having said that I do believe that anyone who puts effort into leaving a useful response should be rewarded, nothing makes me happier  then when I am called out and thanked personally

I wanted to know how others classify an individual in the industry. i.e. What makes an SEO beginner, intermediate or advanced? What skill set separates a pro from a newbie?

Those services you mention which give out thousands of forum profile links are usually not worth your time or money, you see the same thing with generic directory listings, they are useless. Unless the forum topic is relevant to your website and they are do follow then don't waste your time.

I've found that signing up to 3 or 4 popular forums and being really active in them is a lot more beneficial in the long run.