How to Find Good Free SEO Help
03/20/09
Free SEO help is plentiful on the Internet. The difficult part isn't locating help, but figuring out whether what you have found is good, mediocre, or actively harmful to your site. Here is a brief guide from a veteran webmaster.
The search engines themselves are the first place you should look for information about search engine optimization. All the larger search engines have blogs whose contributors are members of the search engine's programming team and whose goal is to help webmasters optimize sites for that particular search engine. Often contributing writers spend time on webmastering forums to learn what problems working webmasters are having, so the articles are timely and practical, not theoretical. The quickest way to locate search engines' blogs is to search for "blog" or "official blog" and the name of the search engine.
Forums are a good source of free SEO help, but a tricky one. On one hand, webmasters' accounts of their experiences and the ensuing debates are indispensable. Webmasters with experience often know when algorithm changes are about to take place, and can discuss changes, legal issues, and other SEO issues freely and without the corporate constraints and need to protect the search engine's interests that the search engines' own bloggers have. Search engines sometimes refuse to discuss or flat out deny certain patterns in their algorithms' behavior, so the only way to get adequate information about certain aspects of a search engine may be through discussion with other webmasters. On the other hand, there is no screening process for forum members, who can use the forum as a soapbox for their conspiracy theories and their favorite strains of bad advice. How do you tell which forums to go to and which members to listen to? It comes down to reading a wide selection of forums and noting patterns over time. Seeing whether an official speaker for a given search engine is a member of the forum is a good idea as well. While an official speaker isn't a stamp of trustworthiness, his or her presence does mean that the forum is influential enough for the search engine to take note. The two forums you should definitely put on your watch list are WebmasterWorld and DigitalPoint. To fill out your lists of forums to watch, Google for "SEO forum."
Free SEO help articles are similarly tricky: There are reams of good articles, and a vast ocean of mediocre, wrong, or actively harmful articles. Keep away from free article directories and authors whose main claim to expertise is the ability to pump out a small flood of SEO articles every month. Look for industry sites and authors whose network of sites you have heard of. Also look for small, expert written article collections and blogs, like that at HubShout. Avoid articles with the rehashed "SEO article" feel: flat, stuffed with keywords, and full of synonyms that make no sense.
As you can see, choosing from the free SEO help available online takes not only the ability to Google, but a touch of judgment on your part. Go slow, verify facts before you put any piece of advice into use, and build a sound base of knowledge, and soon you will be able to tell the good free SEO help from the bad.
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