SEO for Professional website

[pboychuk]

Hello,

I am working for a website for my dad, he is an attorney, Basically I am wondering how to optimize page views, advertise the site, etc., I am not familiar with SEO and how it works, but, I know that this is a little different in that he can only practice in 2 states, so is there a way to focus advertising to just two states? since spending money on any other states would be a waste of money.

Some questions: I am wondering how much will posting his info on all the lawyer search sites help? I figure this is important.

Also, is it worth $30 a month to have the site posted on yellowpages.com i wanted to hold of on this i figured the money could be better spent in another way.

Id love to learn about the subject of SEO, are there any good books, maybe something that doesnt get too much into the coding aspect but more so how it works.

[grants]

seomoz.org is the best seo tools and techniques to improve your rankings and can also good for beginners. And if you want to know more about seo , i am willing to help you and give you advice.

[Aletheides]

Post a bunch of articles centered around the keywords you're targeting ("How to Find a Reputable Washington Attorney") then build links to these articles with varying anchor texts (Washington attorney, attornies in washington, washington lawyer). Social bookmark it, write and submit articles to Ezine and other article directories with links pointing back to your articles/main site in the resource box, buy one way links from other sites.

Basically SEO in a nutshell.

Don't forget to set your metatag, title tags -- search onpage seo.

[JPanar]

Aletheides said pretty much everything important. Write content and collect links pointing to this content. But this content must be unique. Otherwise, Google will not show your content in search results.

Also, what I suggest you to do is write down your keyword list that you are going to use on the site. Use tool like "adwords keyword tool" (I can't post link yet. Search it through Google) to find keywords that are popular. But do not choose very popular keywords because they have more competition. It makes harder to rank in search engine.

And like Aletheides said. Use Meta tags like Title, Description and keywords. Every page should have unique meta tags. Be sure to include your main keywords in meta tags and use those same keywords in content.

[emd5005]

Addressing your question about how to target just two states- if you use Google Adwords for a pay per click campaign (the "sponsored" links on the right and top of google searches), then you can focus on whatever areas you want, including radiuses from other cities, or certain areas.

Let me know if you need any help! I'd be more than happy to assist you in any questions you may have.

Also- I do SEO website evaluations for a [low] fee, in which I take a look at your website and give you specific recommendations for how to increase your search engine ranking. If you're interested, feel free to send your information to ericadewolf [at] gmail [dot] com and we can talk about pricing, and I can provide you with a sample for what you will get.

Good Luck!!

[vbcannon]

The great thing about lawyer websites is that they are usually not SEO'd. I would be more than happy to help you out if you just want to PM me. I would not spend any money on Yellow Pages just yet. Just shoot me a message and I will help you get started with SEO. It won't come quickly but it should come easily.

[zharlene]

Classifieds (Craigslist) on both these states. Also, try to find out the most frequented sites of people in these two states and advertise on these sites. Also: adwords.

[posylane]

To target your two states, be sure to mention them as you would any key word. Personally I find paper ads to be a waste of money. Maybe that is different for lawyers but our retail friends and myself don't do paper unless your business is very high end (and you advertize accordingly).

Google adwords will let you target specific states. That could be bad though as often visitors to my website are attributed to one state, but when they order and buy you see they are from another. So your ads might be viewed by the wrong crowd and not seen by your target audiance.

[wully00]

Work on building a great site is my recommendation. Pay Per Click is a good jumpstart as well before the SEO starts paying off. PM me if you need any more info.

Best,

[markguim]

make sure to have titles in your href links and alts for your pictures.

[flnazrael]

Couple of articles I've written that may help:

Building Links? 13 Ways To Determine Link Quality. | Web Development Blog

Avoiding Common Search Engine Optimization Rip-Offs | Web Development Blog


Regarding targeting certain cities or states, there have already been some great suggestions (without having to go the PPC route). Make sure you add the site to Google Local and Yahoo Local. Also make sure the address of the firm, with the state spelled out, is in the footer (or somewhere) on each page.