Posted by Lawn Care Marketing | Posted in lawn care business | Posted on 01-02-2010
Okay my fellow “I want to rank my lawn business/landscaping company to rank high on Google” followers. This post is super important.
Pay attention. I mean it. This stuff is right out of my SEO testing laboratory, deep in the Central FL woods.
I’m about to dispel a long standing myth regarding getting on the first page of Google with your website. Ready? Here ya go:
It’s not how many competitors you have, it’s how good is the competition is !!! To see the photo proof you gotta click “continue reading below. Do it.
Check this out. Using only a few of the back link tricks I show on my lawn business site (hint,hint) I was able to rank my test site (type into Google “Chicago lawn care”) much faster for 5 million competing pages than I was my Dallas lawn care site for around a million returns. A 5 to 1 ratio. Why, you may ask, is that? Hmmmmm. I know why, but I wonder where they learned it? Guess what? I found the reason.
It seems, from my “who is this guy” investigating, that last year Green Paws lawn care in Dallas TX was reading (and obviously implementing) my posts when I used to actively participate on the Gopher Lawn Forum. Yikes! 99.9% of all the Gopher readers didn’t listen to a word I wrote, and I just happen to randomly pick a city where I gotta compete with my own stuff? Rats. Just my luck! It also shows the power of posting on forums. Most of GP’s 400+ links come from forum posts.
Don’t get me wrong. I applaud Green Paws for actually using my info. I guess it was not entirely “pearls before swine” after all. I guess my time was not completely wasted on that forum.
Also, please understand that if you read only ONE lawn care forum, it should be Steve’s. He is a tireless maniac hell bent on your success. Don’t look a “gift Steve” in the mouth 
So, look at the screen shots below, and take my word for it that fighting Green Paws for “Dallas TX Lawn Care” was much harder than trying to rank for “Chicago lawn care.”
And, we both know ( if you have been reading this blog) that mentioning “GP” in a blog post about Dallas TX awn care, even without an anchor link, means he will overtake me again. Or, getting to the top with less than 100 links could be a short lived fluke.
That’s cool, I don’t mind going back to the drawing board. May the best man win View the screen shots below:
Domain choice has a lot to do with web ranking as well. By mentioning “Dallas” in the request to Google it will rank pages with “Dallas” in the actual domain a little better. Another thing to point out is the page title you choose versus the competition. Your page title begins with “Dallas TX” which is another huge plus when it comes to ranking your site.
You are spot on by mentioning ranking well has to do with how smart your competition is in regard to SEO practices.
Readers here should also note… Some forums and sites are “nofollow” meaning Google will only read and index the content you post. If the forum is “nofollow” the back links will not count or better your page rank.
Keep up the good work. I have been pushing a few lawn guys to your site to learn a few tricks. Give me a shout if we can ever help.
Thanks
That #1 spot was short lived! I’ve now bounced back to page 3.
The Google algos are in a major flux right now. I’ve got sites bouncing around the first few pages like ping pong balls at the moment.
My thoughts on “no follow” are this: many spiders “blow the stop sign” and index those links anyway.
And having some “no follow” links are a good thing. If you are manipulating the search results, the NF links help make your efforts appear more natural.