25,600 indexed, outranked by MUCH smaller site for crucial keyword

Discussion in 'SEO' started by bflora, May 31, 2006.

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  1. #1
    I run a portal for Culver Academy Summer Campers with a wiki, a blog, a forum, dynamic ebay listings of camp memorabilia, a photo gallery, and even some videos from camp. Google lists 26,000 pages in their index from the site and we receive about 300 uniques a day.

    In short, I have a butt load of content for people interested in "Culver Academy" and while the site's hardly large, it is visited regularly.

    and yet my google rankings for this keyword suck. According to Digital point, http://www.GoCulver.com isn't even ranked for "Culver Academy" even though its a PR 5 with all this content.

    Here's what drives me nuts though, http://www.laurenlas.com/culver.htm is consistently ranked #11 for "Culver Academy." Its just a side page off one of my Culver friend's personal pages with some pictures and text.

    What's going on here? Why is her page ranked so high for this keyword while mine flounders? What can I do to boost my ranking for this keyword? Is there something wrong with my site that I'm overlooking?

    I wonder if I'm overlooking something simple...Google adwords tells me that there is not enough content on my front page to generate keywords....which makes no sense to me. Can anyone tell from my homepage what the problem might be that's preventing Google from "seeing" my front page and keeping me in the dumps for SEO?
     
    bflora, May 31, 2006 IP
  2. adamjthompson

    adamjthompson Well-Known Member

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    #2
    Your site is not optimized for the keyword "Culver Academy". That keyword phrase appears nowhere in the visible text of your page. Download WebCEO, and use it to help you optimize your page.

    Also, do you use the phrase "culver academy" in the anchor text of your backlinks?

    ~Adam
     
    adamjthompson, May 31, 2006 IP
  3. hooperman

    hooperman Well-Known Member

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    #3
    Just curious, but in what way have you optimised your pages for the specific phrase "Culver Academy"?

    "culver academy" appears only once on your homepage in the title (I doubt that the occurrences in your meta tags will lend much weight).
     
    hooperman, May 31, 2006 IP
  4. bflora

    bflora Active Member

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    #4
    Heh. Ok, points taken!

    Like I said, I think I was overlooking the obvious....

    I've added a little blurb to the leftbar with Culver Academy and Culver Military Academy in it, both keywords I'm interested in. Should that help?

    And I'm going to see about changing the anchor text of my backlinks...hadn't thought of that but I guess its pretty basic.

    What else?
     
    bflora, May 31, 2006 IP