Your Practice and SEOQuake

By now you know all about Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools, and how they can improve your practice’s website. The third essential tool for a web owner is a program called SEOQuake. It is a "must have" to check your own page’s Google score, SEO, and indexing. Use it to compare your practice’s web traffic with your competitor’s traffic. It is a free download and works on both PC and Macs.

Unlike Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools, SEOQuake is not a Google product - it’s a Mozilla Firefox product. It works with your browser and automatically provides data about every page you surf on the Internet. While it does provide a variety of data, I like using it to determine a page’s Google Score.

What is Your Google Score?
Google ranks pages according to an algorithm. The ranking ranges from N/A to 10. For instance, a brand new site and a stale site will have the N/A distinction. Google.com boasts a perfect "10.”

The score increases with the age and reliability of the site. A higher score indicates that the site has been established and is trusted (in Google terms). It also indicates how viable the site is based on traffic, links and visits. Better scored sites have more traffic, more incoming and outgoing links, and fresh content.

Why You Need Your Score
I frequently find higher ranked sites than my own. My blog took about six months to achieve a score of “1” (I was so happy!). It now has a “3” as it approaches its second birthday (I am hoping it will increase the score as it turns 2!).

My score will help my online presence by elevating my web rankings on SERPs (search engine results pages). With a higher score, I'll have more clout.

I also use SEOQuake to determine whether or not I'd like to establish a link from that site to mine. Establishing links from a higher scored site to yours will increase your own SEO and elevate your rankings. The two linked sites should be similar in nature (e.g. both should be health-related sites).

You can also use SEOQuake to check to see how many of pages are indexed on Gooble, Bing and Yahoo. It will give you an idea of how visible your site is to the different search engines.

Knowing your own Google SEO score can also keep you abreast of your competition. You might get an idea of how well one site is "working" compared to our own. Along the same lines, sometimes I come across a pretty nifty "looking" site, only to find the site has no score at all.

Use SEOQuake, Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools to make sure that your site is working, ranking, and is as constructed as well as you think it can be. While your content will appeal to your readers, use these tools to make sure your site appeals to the search engines.
 

Learn more about Randall Wong and our other contributing bloggers here.