The first thing to do is to go back and review your previous efforts. Go through and check everything about your website and see what can be done to improve the situation. In order to review your website you should check the following things:
1. Your Tags
Are the keywords you have chosen prominent in the title tag of your website? Is there anything that can be done to improve this and make it more important?
2. Keyword Density
Check the keyword density of your website. How often does your keyword appear in the content of your website? It is a good idea to check this against the top 10 website for your chosen keyword. Are you lower than them and can you increase it without ruining the content of your website?
3. Number of Inbound Links
How many links do you have and how does this compare to the top 10 websites for that keyword? Are you significantly lower than them? If this is the case you will need to improve the number of links you have in order to compete for that keyword. However remember it is not always quantity but also quality. What type of links do you have? Are they mostly reciprocal? If yes then think of ways to get one way links as this will quickly improve your situation.
4. Anchor Text Used
How often do your keywords appear in the text that links to your website? The more often the better. If you have lots of links but very few have your anchor text the search engines might not think this keyword is important to you. The aim should be to get as many links as possible that contain your keywords within the anchor text so if you can improve this do.
Many of you may be in the situation where you have got your website to appear in the search engines but might have stopped moving when you got to the 4th page. You might be wondering why you have stopped and how you can get things moving again. Well do the review that has been described above and pay close attention to the sites you are competing against.
However it is important to remember that SEO takes time and if you are moving in the right direction you are probably doing the right thing. You need to have patience and continue with your efforts. With time and consistency the most competitive of keywords can be broken in the end. The worst thing you can do is panic and completely change your strategy. The search engines reward consistency and value websites that are building links gradually. If you really think you are doing the same things as the top sites then keep going and you will, with time, break through and get a top 10 ranking for your chosen keyword. Time and patience that is all that is needed to make any SEO campaign a great success for any website owner.
